


Cahills vs Vespers

by Callie_Girl



Series: All of the moments of... [2]
Category: The 39 Clues - Various Authors
Genre: Canon Compliant
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-15
Updated: 2019-11-22
Packaged: 2020-12-17 01:10:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 28,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21045830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Callie_Girl/pseuds/Callie_Girl
Summary: All of the hostage moments from the Cahills Versus Vespers series.





	1. The Medusa Plot

Napa Valley, California, 5:42 A.M., Pacific Time Zone

Fiske Cahill loved the early morning — the glorious moment when the sun’s rays broke over the mountaintops. He would always be an easterner, but there was no place quite like California.

He eased himself into the mineral bath, feeling the bracing sting of water heated by magma trapped deep within the earth. The ache and stiffness of his sixty-nine-year-old body seemed to melt away, and he knew complete relaxation and contentment. Nothing could spoil the perfection of this moment.

He closed his eyes. That was his first mistake.

There was a tiny splash as the snake hit the water. It was a water moccasin, a baby—the venom is strongest in the very young.

Fiske never saw it. He was aware of a sudden stab, followed by blinding pain and then blackness.

Two men in coveralls lifted him out of the tub and administered a tiny injection of antivenom to his abdomen. Then they wrapped him up in a vinyl pool cover, carried him to a panel truck, and loaded him inside.

As an afterthought, one of the men fished the snake out of the water and tossed it into some tall grass. If it survived and happened to bite another resort guest, it was no concern of theirs.

Ponce, Puerto Rico, 9:42a.m., Atlantic Time Zone

Long, powerful strokes propelled Reagan Holt through the sparkling Caribbean. At thirteen, she had already completed seven Ironman triathlons, but now she was training for the world championships. Puerto Rico’s lesser-known southern coast was the ideal place for it — great weather, uncrowded roads for running and cycling, and warm, crystal-clear water for swimming. There was even entertainment for these grueling ocean marathons. Through her goggles, she enjoyed the floor show: hundreds of fish species, colorful coral, and …

A jolt of surprise threw off her rhythm, and she struggled to maintain her textbook form. At first she thought it was an undersea mirage, but no. Twenty yards away, a few feet below the surface, floated a scuba diver in an antishark cage!

What’s going on?

That was when she saw the hammerhead.

It was big—an eighteen footer at least. It moved in a serpentine pattern, its oddly placed eyes sweeping the reef. When its attention locked on Reagan, she knew instantly. The long body became a guided missile hurtling toward her.

Panic was immediate and total. Not even the fastest human could outswim a shark.

The cage. It was her only option. She made for it, expecting at any moment to feel the devastating bite of jagged teeth. The diver read her mind and opened the cage door. She flung herself inside, slamming the gate shut behind her just as the hammer-shaped snout smashed into the titanium bars. The very sea itself seemed to shake. Reagan was thrown back against the frame, but the structure held.

The diver pulled on a signal rope, and a mechanical winch began to lift the cage out of the water. As they broke the surface, she spied the boat. Relief flooded over her. The cost of this training session would not be her life.  
Crew members swung them in over the gunwale and set them down on the deck.

It was all Reagan could do to maintain her footing as she stepped onto the wood planking. “Thanks, you guys! That was so close —”

And then she noticed that one of the sailors was pointing a gun at her.

London, UK, 1:42 P.M., Greenwich Mean Time Zone

When anyone advised Natalie Kabra to “find a happy place,” that place was always Harrods.

That was the reason for this mental health day away from her boarding school. When the going gets tough, the tough go shopping. And where better than the most famous department store in the world, located in the heart of London’s Knightsbridge?

A glance at a bus-stand billboard took the wind out of her sails. It was an advertisement for AidWorksWonders, a nonprofit organization dedicated to global disaster relief. Peering compassionately out was the organization’s founder, radiating charity, goodwill, and kindness.

Natalie didn’t believe it for a second, and she was in a position to know. That woman, Isabel Kabra, was Natalie’s mother—a hard-hearted, cold-blooded conspirator, arsonist, murderer, and terrorist. The only reason she had formed an organization that did good in the world was that it had been her ticket out of jail, to parole and community service. Natalie pitied the poor community Isabel was assigned to serve.

Just the sight of her mother almost made her turn around and go back to school. It had been Mum who had first introduced her to Harrods. But one couldn’t blame Harrods for that, Natalie concluded, stepping in through the brass-plated revolving door.

Muscle memory took her directly to the Girls’ department — designer only, of course. Without once consulting a price tag, she collected an armload of outfits and headed for the fitting room. She stepped inside, wondering at the second click that came a moment after she shut the door. She tried the handle. Locked. And then her world tilted, dropping her against the mirror. The entire cubicle lifted suddenly and began to move forward.

In the Girls’ department, the shoppers paid little attention to the large box being carried out of the department by two employees in Harrods uniforms. No one heard the screams that could not penetrate the soundproof enclosure.

Paris, France, 2:42 P.M., Central European Time Zone

To Nellie Gomez, Les Fraises was the best sidewalk café in Paris, and she had tried most of them.

Nellie adored Paris. As much as she missed home, this monthlong class in French cuisine was a dream come true. She loved living in a place where nose rings and punk-rock hair and makeup were considered completely normal. She loved the sights of the city, from the ancient Roman ruins to the ultramodern glass pyramid entrance to the Louvre.

But mostly, she loved the food. Her seminar on sauces had run through lunch, which gave her the perfect excuse to visit Les Fraises in the state she was usually in — hungry.

The chocolate-strawberry croissant looked a little different as the waitress placed the plate on the table next to her espresso. Was that confectioner’s sugar on top? Was the chef trying to improve upon perfection? She was anxious to find out.

Nellie raised the pastry to her lips.

Poof!

A cloud of powder burst from the croissant, enveloping her face. It was gone in a few seconds. But by then, Nellie was slumped in her seat, unconscious. An ambulance pulled up to the café. Two white-coated attendants emerged.

They lifted Nellie out from behind the table, loaded her into the back, and drove away.

Tel Aviv, Israel, 3:42 P.M., Israel Standard Time Zone

“This way, children.”

Alistair Oh held out his arm and guided Ned and Ted Starling into the elevator of the medical office building. How tragic it was that Alistair, at sixty-six, would be offering his assistance to two teenagers in the very prime of youth and strength. It should have been the other way around. Alas, such was the legacy of the search for the 39 Clues. The boys had been victims of a cowardly act of sabotage at the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia.

Ned now suffered headaches of such intensity that he could not concentrate for more than a few minutes at a time. He was the lucky one. His brother was legally blind.

Alistair sighed. Perhaps Dr. Shallit could help. That was the purpose of their trip to Israel — to see the foremost neurologist in the world. He had achieved miraculous results for patients with similar injuries.

Alistair pressed the button, and the elevator began to ascend. At the eighteenth floor, the car slowed and stopped.

The door did not open.

The next thing he knew, they were dropping, freefalling down the elevator shaft, picking up speed.

“Children —” The word died on his lips. There was nothing reassuring to say about plummeting two hundred feet to a violent death.

He tightened his grip on the boys’ forearms. What an odd place for their lives to end. Yet it was somehow fitting that members of the same family branch should perish together.

In the space of a few vertical feet, the elevator went from terminal velocity to a dead stop. The sudden deceleration flattened all three of them to the floor. Ned bumped his head and cried out in pain and fear.

The door opened. Three large men blocked the entrance to the underground parking garage, their faces obscured by desert head scarves. The leader reached down to grab Alistair. He underestimated the older man’s determination.

Alistair’s diamond handled cane came up and fractured the man’s wrist. The attacker cursed and withdrew in pain. Alistair boosted the boys to their feet. “Run!” he ordered.

Ned took his blind brother’s arm, ducked beneath the hands that were reaching for them, and took off down a long row of cars. One of the assailants followed in hot pursuit.

They were almost at the exit when Ted stubbed his foot against a cement parking curbstone. He never hit the floor. Their pursuer grabbed him in a powerful bear hug.

Ned hesitated as the onslaught of another headache shattered everything in his mind except pain.

No. Not now—

With almost superhuman effort, he turned back to his brother. Ted was caught, and Alistair was subdued back at the elevator. Only he was free.

Alistair’s voice echoed in the concrete space. “Go! Call William McIntyre!”

With a heavy heart, Ned Starling fled.

Tokyo, Japan, 10:42 P.M., Japan Standard Time Zone

Phoenix Wizard was searching for the hip-hop vibe.

That’s what his cousin Jonah had told him to look for. It should have been easy to find in a crowd of screaming fans, all jumping, stomping, and shouting along with Jonah Wizard, the number one recording artist on the planet.

The teenage rapper was spectacular. From the upper decks of the enormous stadium he must have appeared insect-size on the stage far below. And yet every move, every beat, every “wassup, yo” sent ripples through the audience. Jonah was a hip-hop hypnotist, and all sixty-five thousand people in the arena were obeying his commands — to get wild, get loud, get down.

Except one.

Phoenix worshipped his A-list cousin. What twelve-year-old boy wouldn’t idolize a celebrity? And Jonah wasn’t just famous in the music world. He had starred in several movies, including Gangsta Kronikles, his first blockbuster; he had his own reality TV show. His face was immortalized on PEZ dispensers and motorized lollipop holders. Paparazzi followed him everywhere.

Yet the music — that was the part that left Phoenix flat. He would have cut his tongue out before saying it aloud, but he thought it was truly awful. Just talking, really. Bragging in time to a simple repeating beat.

Why can’t I see what all these people see?

Jonah began to whip up the crowd to even greater heights. “I love Tokyo — it’s the only place where ‘yo’ is part of the name of the town! Get up and show me some moves!”

The response was seismic. Those fans who weren’t already standing rose to their feet in a wave of tens of thousands of bodies. Phoenix was up with them, hoping that their enthusiasm was contagious.

He felt nothing. What could be more pathetic than a Wizard with no rhythm?

All around him, people were gyrating as if their very lives depended on it. He watched, amazed, as bodies were lifted up and rolled across the top of the crowd, passing from hand to hand.

A teen girl floated over him, her expression sheer bliss. She had found the hiphop vibe. Determined to share the experience, he climbed onto the armrest of his seat, literally hoisting himself onto the “roof” of the audience. He felt a thrill when he started to move, twirling as he skimmed above the concertgoers’ heads. For some reason, there was no fear. The thousands of hands created a seamless surface. It was almost like swimming — riding ocean currents around the stadium. This was awesome! He couldn’t wait to tell Jonah about it after the concert.

And the ride was getting better! He seemed to be picking up speed. But why was he heading away from the stage toward one of the exit tunnels? That wasn’t where the action was!

Then he was down out of the throng, in the darkness of the concrete passage, flanked by two men in mirrored sunglasses.

“What —?”

A foul-smelling wet cloth covered his face. He attempted to struggle, but one whiff of the chloroform brought oblivion.

Although they took place in different time zones throughout the world, the kidnappings were executed at exactly the same moment. The victims had only one thing in common: All seven were members of the Cahill clan, the most powerful family in human history.

Nellie Gomez awoke to a splitting headache. Worse, she was still hungry.

“Where’s my croissant?” she demanded of the person leaning over her.

“Dear child,” came a strangely familiar voice.

“Don’t ‘dear child’ me!” she snapped. The twenty-two-year-old punk rocker ran black-polished fingernails through black-and-orange-dyed hair, which did nothing to soothe the pounding behind her black-shaded eyes. “Give me my croissant or I’ll —”

It was then that she realized she was threatening the venerable Alistair Oh. “Alistair, what are you doing here?”

“The same thing we all are, I fear,” came the reply. “We’ve been kidnapped.”

That banished the headache. Nellie sat bolt upright and looked around. Fiske Cahill, Reagan Holt, and Natalie Kabra flanked Alistair. Ted Starling sat on a straight-backed wooden chair, staring at nothing with sightless eyes. All five wore baggy jumpsuits.

“Where are we?” Nellie demanded. “What is this place?” She examined her surroundings. Sterile white walls; no windows; high air vents, well out of reach; cameras everywhere.

“We were hoping you would know,” Fiske sighed. “Underground, perhaps. Or in some kind of bunker. We don’t see our jailers. Food comes in through that dumbwaiter in the corner.”

“Has anybody seen Amy and Dan?” Oh, God, please don’t let them be part of this…

Fiske read her mind. “Thankfully, they seem to have escaped our fate.”

“So far,” Nellie agreed grimly. She got up and began to prowl around. The main area was surrounded by small bedrooms containing bunk beds. It wasn’t luxury, but it wasn’t a dungeon, either.

She walked over and banged on the dumbwaiter. “Hey! I want to talk to the guy in charge!”

“I already tried that,” Reagan told her. “You never get an answer. All you get is a sore throat.” She was as restless as a jungle cat. Lack of physical activity made all the Holts that way.

“I believe we’re in the United States somewhere,” Fiske offered. “Or possibly Mexico.”

“How do you figure that?” asked Nellie.

“I was in California,” he replied. “And since I arrived here first, that might indicate that my travel time was the shortest.”

“I was second,” put in Reagan. “Puerto Rico.”

“Harrods,” Natalie added wanly. “The new collections had just come in.”

“The boys and I were in Tel Aviv,” Alistair added. “Ned got away, I hope.”

“Or they killed him,” Ted said quietly.

“And I was in Paris,” Nellie concluded. “I think I’m missing the soufflé test at the Académie.” She looked at her watch, only to find it gone.

“No watches, no cell phones,” Fiske supplied. “Our captors don’t want us to know what time it is, or even what day.”

“And they have a ghastly sense of style,” Natalie mourned, gesturing toward a rack of jumpsuits in varying sizes. “I hope someone pays the ransom soon.”

“If it’s ransom they’re after,” added Ted.

“What else could it possibly be?” demanded Natalie, a shrill edge to her voice.

Nellie thought she might know. Synchronized kidnappings from different places around the world. An organized, coordinated operation, all the victims Cahills.

Her eyes met Fiske’s.

A buzzer went off inside the suite. It was so loud that all six captives grabbed at their ears and winced in pain. The main door whisked open and a new arrival was deposited on the floor.

Reagan flung herself at the opening, but she was a split second too late. The panel slid shut, leaving an unbroken wall. She bounced off, shouting and nursing her shoulder.

The buzzer ceased, and blessed quiet descended.

Nellie rushed over and knelt beside the new arrival. “He’s just a kid!”

Natalie frowned. “Who is he? I thought they were only kidnapping Cahills.”

“A case of mistaken identity, perhaps?” Alistair mused.

“I don’t think so.” Reagan pointed to the clothing rack. On one end hung a child-size jumpsuit. “They were expecting him.”

With a groan, the boy rolled over and sat up, revealing his face in full.

“He is a Cahill,” said Fiske in recognition. “Meet Phoenix Wizard, Jonah’s young cousin.”

The boy began to blink, and Nellie put her arms around him. He reminded her of Dan back when she was first hired on as the Cahill kids’ au pair. “Phoenix— you okay, kiddo?”

“I — I don’t know.” He surveyed the suite. “Where am I?”

“You’re with family,” Nellie replied. It was the most comforting thing she could think of in a situation that was far from comforting.

The mood inside the holding cell had gone from shock to fear to frustration, settling at last into a kind of resigned boredom. The determination to discover the nature of their captivity and to escape was as strong as ever. But they had made absolutely zero progress.

They did not know the identity of their captors. They did not know where they were being held. Ted insisted that he sometimes heard voices beyond the walls. The others believed him — his hearing seemed more acute due to his lack of sight. But so far, he had not been able to make out a single word, or even an accent.

At first, their plan had been to make a break for the door the instant the next hostage was delivered. But Phoenix had been the final arrival. Since he had been deposited on the floor, the walls of the cell had been their entire universe. Except for the dumbwaiter, which sent down meals and fresh laundry, they had no contact whatsoever with the outside world.

Yesterday, Reagan had climbed into the dumbwaiter, hoping to be hauled out as dirty dishes. She’d sat there for a solid hour before giving up. Their next meal had been a pitcher of water and a loaf of stale bread.

“Don’t get me wrong — I hate these guys,” was Nellie’s opinion. “But when it comes to running a prison, they know what they’re doing.”

Fiske nodded sadly. “They have certainly put a great deal of effort into isolating us completely. We have been here several days and have learned nothing.”

“Several days?” Natalie repeated. “I think I’ve missed my hair appointment.”

“We’ve got bigger problems than your bad hair day,” Nellie said irritably.

Reagan slammed her fist into her palm. “I can’t stand it that we’re just sitting around like helpless idiots!”

“It’s very wearing,” Alistair agreed, his right arm twitching. He felt incomplete without his walking stick. “Still, there’s nothing for it but to wait until something happens. We can’t act — we can only react. The next move belongs to our captors.”

At that moment, the panel swept aside. Reagan did not hesitate. She ran headlong at the opening. The first thing she saw beyond the walls of their prison was a large hunting crossbow—the kind that could fell a buck at three hundred yards. It was pointed at a patch of skin between her eyes; range: eighteen inches. She backed away from the weapon and the masked jailer wielding it.

Another captor appeared behind the first, also masked. But instead of a bow, this one carried a small snub-nosed pistol. Holding it out in front of him, he approached the hostages.

Fiske stepped forward. “Put that thing away, and we can talk about this like civilized people.” He was shoved aside and went sprawling into the rack of jumpsuits.

The jailer pointed the gun at the nearest captive—Natalie. The girl was so frightened that she could barely manage to shrink away from him.

“No.”

The word resonated from all around them, as if the cell itself were a speaker.

The hostages looked about in shocked bewilderment. The voice was electronically distorted, almost robotic sounding, yet the authority was unmistakable. The jailer with the pistol froze instantly, awaiting instructions.

“Not her,” the voice boomed.

“Who, then?” he asked the four walls.

“Suit yourself.”

It happened so quickly that no one had a chance to move defensively. With lightning speed, the jailer pointed the snub-nose at Nellie and squeezed the trigger. An earsplitting crack resounded in the small enclosed space.

Nellie clutched at her shoulder, her face twisted with pain. Dark red blood trickled out between her fingers. Before the horrified gaze of her fellow prisoners, she crumpled to the floor. Alistair rushed to her aid.

In a fury, Reagan flung herself at the attacker. Her action cost her dearly. The guard with the crossbow smashed the shaft of the weapon against the side of her head. She went down, stunned.

Both jailers backed out of the room. The wall swept shut behind then.

Phoenix and Natalie clung together, crying.

Ted stood up, helpless and bewildered. “What just happened?”

Fiske was closest to Reagan and hurried to help her up. “Very brave, my dear, but very foolish.”

Alistair knelt beside Nellie and touched her neck, feeling for a pulse.

Nellie lay on her bunk in the Vesper holding cell, propped up by pillows donated by the other six hostages.

Young Phoenix had not left her side since the attack. He was pale. “What does it feel like to get shot?”

“I don’t recommend it,” said Nellie in a controlled voice. “Chocolate is definitely better.” She managed a wink.

“Swiss,” Natalie added longingly. Her trips to Harrods always ended in the Imported Confectionery department.

“Could you feel the bullet going in?” Ted asked from a chair in the corner.

“It was more like being hit by a bus,” Nellie replied. “The sensation was all over, not just one spot. The wound itself didn’t start hurting until later.”

“They’re going to send a doctor to take the bullet out, right?” Reagan asked impatiently.

“One would assume so,” put in Alistair, looking worried. “If our captors’ intention was murder, we would all be dead already.”

Nellie shifted her position on the mattress, wincing in pain. “Well, I hope they hurry up about it,” she complained. “If I wanted to be tortured, I’d go to the opera.”

Fiske spoke sharply to the four walls. “We need medical attention immediately. We have a gunshot wound that requires treatment.”

“You’re not going to get through to them by talking like an English professor,” scoffed Reagan. “Hey!” she bawled. “Get a doctor down here! She’s in pain, thanks to you! What are you going to do about it?”

There was a moment of silence as Reagan’s echo reverberated around the cell.

Then they heard the rattle and hum of the dumbwaiter system.

Everyone but Nellie and Ted rushed into the main room. Reagan threw open the small door, and they looked inside.

There sat a glass of water and two Tylenol tablets.

Alistair’s cane hand shook with agitated disbelief. “They can’t be serious!”

“I’m afraid they are,” said Fiske in a low voice. “They’re serious about wanting young Nellie to suffer.”

The fever was back.

It had been moderate yesterday, but now Nellie was wracked with chills. She lay shivering on the cot, her face deathly white, her lips dry and cracked. She had pushed her jumpsuit off her shoulder, revealing an angry wound, raised, purple, and hot to the touch.

She was in bad shape, she was pretty sure, because she’d had no appetite since yesterday. When Nellie couldn’t eat, something was seriously wrong. And even if she didn’t understand it herself, she could see the urgency of the situation reflected in the faces of her fellow captives. Especially Phoenix, poor kiddo.

Fiske and Alistair consulted in whispers so the patient would not overhear.

“The situation is dire,” Fiske admitted. “That wound is deeply infected, I fear. If the bullet is not removed soon, she could very well die.”

Alistair was distracted with worry. “We could appeal to our jailers’ humanity, but I honestly believe they don’t have any.” His cane hand twitched so badly that he rarely removed it from his jumpsuit pocket. “Is this sport to them, to inflict a minor wound and then to watch like spectators as it festers into something mortal?”

“We cannot allow it to happen,” Fiske said firmly. “We must find a way to get through to our captors.” His eyes fell on the remains of their most recent meal on the table. The plastic bottle of ketchup caught his attention. He smoothed out a paper napkin and wrote, squeezing out thin red lines:

SHE’S DYING

PLEASE HELP

He intercepted a look of wide-eyed horror from Phoenix and cursed himself for not being more careful with the message. The youngster had become quite attached to Nellie, and her condition terrified him.

It terrified all of them.

Fiske placed the napkin in the dumbwaiter and closed the door. A moment later, they heard the device creaking its way up out of the cell.

Nellie’s feeble voice came from the bedroom. “Can somebody crank the heat in this meat locker?”

There were no more blankets, so Reagan yanked an armload of jumpsuits off the rack. She and Phoenix raced in and began to pile them on the patient.

Nearly twenty agonizing minutes had gone by before Fiske noticed the dumbwaiter rattling its way down again. He caught Alistair’s attention and the two exchanged an anxious glance. In a few seconds they would have their answer, and it would literally be a matter of life and death.

They snatched the door open and stared in bewilderment. There on a stainless steel surgical tray sat a scalpel, tweezers, a bottle of alcohol, and a sterile bandage.

“Yes, but where’s the doctor?” Alistair exclaimed impatiently.

Fiske took a deep breath. “There will be no doctor.”

“Then what on earth could be the point of—” Light dawned on Alistair. “Absolutely not! If this is their idea of sick entertainment, I’ll have no part of it.”

Fiske regarded him gravely. If Nellie was to be saved, they would have to remove the bullet themselves.

The test was conducted in the main room of the Vesper holding cell. Fiske, Alistair, Reagan, Natalie, and Phoenix each brandished a piece of plastic cutlery to determine which of them had the steadiest hand.

“It would appear,” Fiske decided, “that young Phoenix is our ‘winner.’”

The boy turned white as a sheet. “Me? I can’t cut Nellie! What if I do something wrong?”

“What if we do nothing at all?” Fiske countered.

“Let me do it!” Reagan exclaimed. “My hand is as steady as anybody’s.”

Alistair shook his head. “I admire your courage, child. But Phoenix has the touch that’s required.”

“Just so long as I don’t have to,” Natalie quavered, wrapping herself in her own arms. “The whole thing is so — medieval!”

Nellie’s weak voice came from the bedroom. “I’m shot; I’m not deaf.” She had been drifting in and out of consciousness as her fever rose and fell.

“All right, I’ll do the surgery,” Phoenix agreed. “But someone has to tell me every move.”

“You have my word,” Fiske promised. He did not bother to mention that removing the scalpel from the dumbwaiter had been the first time he’d ever touched one.

They tore apart a sheet to make bandannas that served as surgical mass. The bed was their operating table, simply because no one had the courage to move the patient. Phoenix entered the room, his hands as washed and sterilized as he could make them.

It was time.

Nellie did her best to smile at him. “You can do this, kiddo.” She watched his eyes fill with tears. “And no crying. You have to see what you’re doing.”

He picked the scalpel off the tray and Nellie bit hard on the gag in her mouth.

It was all the comfort she was going to get. This operation would be without anesthesia.

Phoenix was amazed at how easily the scalpel cut through flesh. The gag muffled Nellie’s cry of pain. She tried to squirm away, but Reagan pressed her down to the mattress, keeping her firmly in place. Blood covered the incision, and Fiske mopped it away with a fistful of the sheet fabric.

“A second cut,” Alistair suggested, observing from a step back so his twitching arm wouldn’t jostle Phoenix. “Forming an X. It will open wider and allow you to get inside.”

And although he wasn’t sure he could even hold the scalpel, Phoenix did as he was told. More blood. He felt the top of his head rising toward the ceiling and fought it back down again. Of course there’s blood! When you cut people, they bleed! He had to keep it together. Everybody was counting on him.

“Tweezers,” Fiske instructed, none too steady himself.

Almost in slow motion, Phoenix set the bloody scalpel down and picked up the tweezers. He could hear Nellie’s moaned complaint as he probed into the flesh of her torn shoulder.

“I don’t feel it,” he said, hysteria rising.

“Move the instrument around,” Fiske coached. “Gently.”

Phoenix was sweating now. He could feel the moisture pouring down his face, stinging his eyes. On the other side of the bed, Ted had gotten up from his chair and was pacing the room, hugging the wall. Natalie was curled up in a corner, whimpering. Even Reagan had lost her Holt bravado and was looking on in awe and dread.

All at once, Phoenix became aware of something small and hard coming into contact with one tip of the tweezers. “There it is!”

“Excellent,” Fiske approved. “Now pull it out slowly.”

Phoenix worked his wrist and fingers. “I can’t get a grip on it.”

“Keep trying,” Alistair encouraged.

Desperately, Phoenix attempted to maneuver both tips of the instrument around the bullet. He knew that each move caused Nellie unimaginable pain, but he could not grasp the target. “It’s no use,” he sobbed. “And my hand is going numb.”

In a frenzy, Nellie shouted something into the gag, but no one could understand

her.

“I beg your pardon, child?” queried Alistair.

Nellie spat out the rag and rasped, “Get the Kabra chick!”

“Natalie?” Fiske exclaimed. “She’s fallen completely to pieces.”

“Get her!” Nellie demanded. “Anybody with eyebrows plucked like that knows how to use a tweezers!”

Reagan bounded across the room and came back with a shivering, mewling Natalie.

“I can’t!” she wheezed.

Fiske poured alcohol over the girl’s beautifully manicured fingers. “You must.”

Still protesting, her eyes tightly shut, she took over the instrument from Phoenix. “I can’t do it! You can’t make me — oh!” she said in sudden surprise.

“This?” And when she pulled the tweezers out of the wound, the tips were firmly grasping a flattened, blood-slimed bullet.

Nellie laughed — and promptly fainted.


	2. A King's Ransom

“It hurts,” Nellie said.

“I know,” Reagan said. “No pain, no gain.”

“Do you think they made that expression up for bullet wounds?”  
If Nellie expected Reagan Holt, Olympic-level triathlete, to lighten up on her, she was dreaming. Nellie and Reagan were two hostages standing in a bare concrete bunker, but they might have been in an expensive health club for all the focus Reagan was bringing to the session. She’d refused to acknowledge that Nellie’s bullet wound was any big deal (“Oh, please, it was more like a graze.”), refused to concede that without proper equipment they couldn’t train (“We’ve got a wall and a floor, don’t we?”), and dismissed the idea that Nellie could be too weak to try (“There is no try. Only do. Yoda said that, and he was awesome.”).

“Pain is pain,” Reagan said. “Gain is gain. If you don’t rotate that shoulder, it will freeze up, and you’ll be no help to anybody.”

Nellie wanted to rotate it into Reagan’s chin for a nice, satisfying sucker punch, but she knew her tormentor was right. She rolled her shoulder, letting out a hiss of pain.

Fiske Cahill winced and looked over at her sympathetically. In his jumpsuit he looked so pale and thin. She was used to seeing him in black jeans and sweaters, an elegant bohemian. Natalie Kabra stared vacantly at the same spot on the wall she’d been looking at for the past twenty minutes. Nellie was still waiting for Natalie’s natural gifts as a schemer and a fighter to kick in. So far, no such luck. Alistair Oh lay back on the sofa, his eyes closed. In some ways, Nellie thought, the isolation and deprivation were hardest on

Alistair.

No … they were hardest on Phoenix Wizard. Phoenix sat on the floor cross-legged, only a few feet away. He stayed close to Nellie now. He was only twelve years old and he missed his mother. He wouldn’t say it out loud, but Nellie could see every bit of the sorrow and fear he was experiencing in his liquid brown eyes. She winked at him, then made a face behind Reagan’s back. He grinned.

“You’re doing great, Gomez!” Ted Starling cheered her on. He couldn’t see her, but he could hear her grunts and hisses, Nellie knew. Ted had developed phenomenal hearing  
since he’d lost his sight. He always sat in a chair near the door, just in case he could pick up noises from outside. It was Ted who had determined that they must be underground.

“That’s it. Gently now,” Reagan said to Nellie. “We’ll move on to the hard stuff tomorrow.”

“This … isn’t … the hard stuff?” Nellie spit out through gritted teeth.

Reagan grinned. “You really hate me right now, don’t you?”

“Immeasurably.”

“Good. Give me ten.”

Nellie sighed. Her shoulder felt stiff. It ached. Her stomach felt empty. Whoever was preparing meals for the hostages had a rudimentary grasp of cooking. Peel potatoes. Boil. Serve. Nellie’d been enrolled in a cooking course in Paris when she got seized. She’d been about to enjoy a crisp, buttery croissant and a café au lait at her neighborhood café … Do. Not. Think. About. Food.

Nellie pushed against the wall. She straightened her arms, then went forward again in a modified push-up.

“Excellent,” Reagan said.

“Ow,” Nellie grunted.

“Only nine more and you’re done.” Reagan had dropped to the floor and was doing push-ups.

“Five … nine … ten!” Nellie said. She sank down against the wall, resting her head against it.

“I think,” Reagan said as she moved up and down like a piston, “we should all have a plan to keep in shape.” She jumped up and clapped her hands. “Okay, listen up, people. It’s time we set up an organized schedule for exercise.”

Alistair opened his eyes. “My dear, I haven’t exerted myself in years.”

“Then it’s way past time to start, old man.”

“I think it’s a good idea,” Ted said. “We need to keep our muscles active. And our minds. They’re trying to play with our heads. Classic stuff. Strip us of our identities, not let us know what time it is …”

“Feed us carbs,” Natalie said.

Nellie rolled her shoulder again. She felt perspiration break out at her hairline. She hated to admit it, but Reagan was right. They had to be prepared. There were things they could do.

“I’m going to work on individualized training plans for each of you,” Reagan said. “This is going to be awesome!”

Alistair closed his eyes. “I was right,” he said. “This is hell."

“Fifty-four, fifty-five, fifty-six …” Reagan rapped out. She wasn’t even winded.

Nellie struggled with the next sit-up. Alistair had collapsed at seventeen. Fiske had kept up until forty. Natalie was humming to herself as she moved. Ted was concentrating,  
perspiration on his forehead. And Phoenix was following Reagan easily.

“Sixty. Good job, people. Done for the day.”

“Thank you,” Alistair breathed.

“All right,” Reagan said. “Tomorrow we’ll tackle shoulders and arms. That means push-ups, people! And if you want to fit in some extra ab work after dinner, I’ll be cranking out some more crunches.”

At the mention of dinner, Nellie’s stomach growled. “Please don’t mention food,” she said.

Just then they heard the sound of the dumbwaiter shuddering down. Fiske went over and lifted the panel. “Cabbage and potatoes,” he said.

Nellie shook her fist at the camera closest to her. “Hey, bozos!” she yelled. “Get a decent chef!”

“Yelling doesn’t work, remember?” Fiske said mildly. He took out the casserole dish while Alistair set out paper plates. “The last time you complained about the food, we got  
bread and water.”

“I know,” Nellie said. “I’m sorry. It’s just that … what I wouldn’t give for a poulet rôti aux herbes. With crispy frites. And I’d really like to see the look on the French waiter’s  
face when I ask for ketchup.”

“I miss salad,” Natalie said.

“Cookies,” Phoenix said.

“Sushi,” Fiske said.

“Bibimbap,” Alistair put in. “Or a chicken burrito with chipotle sauce.”

“Grilled cheese sandwiches,” Ted murmured. “With pickles.”

Everybody stared down at the cabbage and potatoes on their plates.

Fiske picked up his fork. He took a bite. “Delicious.”

They all exchanged glances. There was nothing to do but eat.

Nellie chewed the overcooked potatoes and the limp cabbage. The casserole dish was scraped clean. Their kidnappers were not generous with portions.  
The casserole dish …

Someone had made a mistake. Their first mistake.

The casserole dish was made of ceramic. Usually they sent food in plastic containers. Nellie noted that Fiske’s gaze had followed hers. She saw the same idea light up his  
eyes. Their gazes met.

Me, Nellie silently asked Fiske … or you?

Me. It had to look like an accident. With her shoulder injury, it just might work.

She dropped the plastic spoon onto her empty plate, then stood. She walked over to the garbage in the corner and tossed them into the container — no recycling for these  
kidnappers. Then she picked up the casserole dish and started toward the dumbwaiter to return it.

“Ow!” she suddenly cried, as though her shoulder had given her a terrible twinge. Her hand jerked, and she dropped the dish. She was sure to release it with force. It shattered,  
the pieces shooting across the floor. A huge shard skittered to a stop against Ted’s foot.

“Sorry!” she called. She bent down and retrieved the pieces. Alistair got up to help, as well as Fiske, Phoenix, and Reagan. Only Natalie continued to eat.

Ted casually put his foot on top of the shard.

They dumped the broken pieces in the dumbwaiter, shut the panel, and returned to the table. One by one, they got up and threw away their plates. Phoenix cleared Ted’s, the way he always did.

Ted’s foot remained on the shard.

Things had changed. Now they had a weapon.


	3. The Dead of Night

“I don’t care about pecs, lats, or smelts,” said Natalie Kabra. “I am boycotting push-ups.”

“Smelts are fish,” said Reagan Holt, who was conducting a workout with Ted Starling, Phoenix Wizard, Alistair Oh, and Fiske Cahill in a dank cell. “What you meant to say was — I want GOOD push-ups, people … thirteen … fourteen — what you meant was delts. As in deltoid muscles. Seventeen … eighteen.”

“I adore fish,” Natalie said with a dreamy sigh. She turned and banged on the cell door. “Excuse me! Hello — wherever you wretched people are? A little sushi down here? I’m wasting away. Look at me!”

Nellie Gomez closed her eyes and counted to ten. She had been looking at Natalie way too much. All of the rest of them, too. It was no fun to be stuck in these tiny cement rooms with one kid who couldn’t see, another who barely talked, a fitness nut, a former burrito maker, and the winner of this year’s Ichabod Crane look-alike contest. They were getting sick, too. All it took was one cold, and they were all infected.

Only germs could thrive in a place like this.

“Yo, Nat, ask for tempura,” Nellie said. “With wasabi on the side. To clear the sinuses.”

She shuddered with a sudden wave of pain. Joking wasn’t so easy anymore, either. Everything above the neck hurt whenever she spoke. Being shot in the shoulder was the Number One worst event in her entire twenty-two years.

Followed close by Numbers Two through Four: being away from gourmet cooking, giving up her iPod cold turkey, and enduring Natalie Kabra.

Natalie glared at her. “Were you trying to make a joke?” she said with a flip of her black hair. “Warn me next time, and I’ll pretend to laugh. Even though mockery is awfully inconsiderate toward someone who saved your life. Oh, and by the way, you’re welcome.”

Nellie didn’t have the energy to answer. Yes, Natalie had pulled the bullet from her shoulder — but only after she’d been forced into action. Her precisely plucked eyebrows made her the hostage with the most tweezer expertise.

And Natalie had been been fishing for compliments ever since.

“Come on, Alistair, sixty is the new thirty — give it to me!” Reagan shouted.

“Twenty-six … twenty-seven …”

“Argghhh …” Alistair Oh collapsed, his once-green prison uniform now a grimy gray. Next to him, a thin, silver-haired Fiske Cahill also hit the floor. “I’m afraid our delts aren’t what they used to be,” Alistair said.

“Actually, mine rather are like smelts,” Fiske added. “Small and floppy.”

Ted’s arms were also wobbling, and Phoenix let out a loud sneeze. “Reagad?” he said, his voice nasal and clogged. “Baybe that’s eduff for today. We’re gettigg codes. We deed rest.”

“We’ll rest when we’re dead, Wizard!” In a whirlwind, Reagan quickly knocked off fifty more push-ups, flipped, and did thirty crunches, then turned and landed a kick that dented the metal door. “I’m feeling sick, too, and look at me. What if Babe Ruth had said ‘Time to rest’? Or Michael Phelps? Or Neil Armstrong? Come on, guys — what are we?”

“Hungry,” Natalie said.

“Sleepy,” Alistair added.

“Grumpy,” Fiske said.

“Sneezy,” Phoenix piped up.

“Shot,” Nellie said.

Reagan was about to launch into another pep talk when Ted held up his hand. 

Nellie adored Ted. He’d been blinded in the explosion in the Franklin Institute, and afterward had become subdued and thoughtful. He didn’t demand attention much, but when he did, he had good reason. Now he was sitting bolt upright.

“’Sup, dude?” Nellie whispered.

Instead of answering, Ted fell to all fours. “Shoulder to shoulder,” he said softly. “Keep it close. Hunch.”

It was an order. Cringing at the pain, Nellie dropped beside him. She eyed the ceiling cameras. Ted clearly wanted to hide something.

In the dust of the prison floor, he scraped in tiny letters:

//They are directly above us.//

“We know that,” Nellie whispered.

//I mean. Close.//  
//I can hear them laughing.//

A couple of seconds later, he rubbed the words out.

Good, Nellie thought. This was new info. New info always helped.

Ted had developed an awesome sense of hearing since he’d lost his eyesight. He’d heard voices in the prison before, but never had he located them so precisely. She wasn’t sure how this helped — yet. But that’s why you became a Madrigal. To use info to your own advantage. She’d had a lot of practice with that.

“Dude, thanks,” she whispered.

“Well, then, they can hear me just fine,” Natalie said, angling her head upward. “Request to food personnel! Send extra soy sauce!”

Nellie stood and clapped her good hand over Natalie’s mouth. Shrieking in surprise, Natalie stumbled backward and fell. “You pulled out my bullet,” Nellie said, “but you’re not going to sabotage us.”

“That is assault and battery!” Natalie cried out. “I shall contact my barrister!”

“Back off, Rambo,” Reagan said, pulling Nellie away. “Martial arts training begins next week!”

Nellie felt pain shooting through her whole body. Bad move, girl.

She hadn’t meant to hurt Natalie. The dirt, the close quarters, the pain — they did something to her head. It was only a matter of time before the hostages began to lose their humanity.

Fighting back the agony, Nellie sidled over to the whimpering Kabra. “Sorry, Nat,” she said. “When we get home? Sushi dinner on me, at my culinary school. But you gotta promise me one thing, okay?”

Natalie looked up warily. “What’s that?”

Nellie put her fingers to her lips. “Stay quiet.”

Wiping away a tear, Natalie nodded.

Taking Ted’s hand, Nellie spelled out How far? with her finger on his palm. Ted traced two vertical lines on her palm. Eleven.

Nellie knew what he meant — eleven feet. She eyed the dumbwaiter door. It was shut tight. The captors had been using the little elevator to convey food and fresh laundry. Up until now, the Cahills had no idea from how far up the stuff had come.

But now they knew they were just a few feet away from their tormentors. On the other side of a thin ceiling. Connected by a dumbwaiter. A dumbwaiter on which they’d already tried to stow away, unsuccessfully.

No, not a dumbwaiter … that’s not how the floors are connected.

An escape idea began to form in Nellie’s brain. While in culinary school, she had also been taking an art course. Her teacher had taught her that art wasn’t only about the objects you painted. It was about the spaces between them.

“No secrets, please, Gomez,” Reagan said. “We’re a team.”

Nellie shushed Reagan and drew everyone into a huddle again. She looked carefully from eye to eye and began mouthing words silently:

//Reagan tried the dumbwaiter, but not the shaft.//

The dumbwaiter began to rattle.

Phoenix Wizard shook like a mouse in an ice bucket. He wasn’t built to be a hero.

Reagan Holt had managed to pry loose two sturdy metal bars from a rickety bed frame. The poles were hidden in the shadows in another room. Nellie was throwing Reagan a thumbs-up. Everyone was trying to be upbeat.

Phoenix blew his nose and added his wet tissue to a pile on the floor. This part is my idea. I don’t HAVE ideas!

What if this failed? What if — ?

A hand landed softly on his arm. Phoenix turned.

Nellie was grinning widely at him. Love ya, she mouthed.

As the dumbwaiter neared bottom, Natalie emerged from the other room. From under her prison garb, she pulled out the metal bars and gave them to Reagan.  
The door opened, revealing a plate of stale bread and a plastic container of warm water.

Now.

Phoenix swept the contents onto the floor. “The eyes!” he shouted.

Fiske and Uncle Alistair both scooped up the wet tissues and began flinging them up at the surveillance camera. Their aim wasn’t bad. One by one, the tissues stuck solidly to the lenses, blocking the view.

“The mouth!” Phoenix said.

Reagan and Nellie dragged a heavy bed across the cement floor. Phoenix pushed off the mattress, leaving a naked metal frame, which they shoved into the dumbwaiter sideways, jamming the door open.

The machinery groaned as it struggled to raise the contraption.

“The guts!”

This was the trickiest part. Phoenix joined Reagan and Ted, who were lifting the bed frame up, using it as a lever. The front of the bed frame pushed against the  
dumbwaiter floor, forcing it down.

Phoenix had figured there must be some clearance, some room in the shaft below the dumbwaiter. They needed the floor to sink about a foot and a half. As the dumbwaiter floor slowly sank, he watched the roof. Above it now was a growing black space of about four inches … six … ten… .

“Now!” Phoenix shouted through gritted teeth.

Uncle Alistair shoved one of the bed-frame bars into the gap between the dumbwaiter roof and the frame of the wall opening. “Not … sure … this will hold …!” he shouted.

With a sickening ping, the metal flew into the shaft like a flicked toothpick.

Alistair doubled over in pain. “My hand!”

The bed frame jerked down. Phoenix’s heart skipped a beat. 

“Keep pushing!” Reagan shouted.

Nellie and Fiske raced to his side. Their added strength allowed Phoenix to duck away and grab the other pole.

“You’ll kill yourself!” Alistair warned. “The pressure is too great!”

Ignoring him, Phoenix reached into the gap. He stuck one end of the pole into a depression in the metal frame of the dumbwaiter. Carefully he slid the other end into a small hole in the wall frame.

It held. Barely.

The dumbwaiter began to vibrate violently. A coil of acrid black smoke rose from below.

And then the motor went dead.

Phoenix leaned his head into the gap and stared upward. A dull greenish-white light emitted from a wall opening about twelve feet above. “I see them!” he said.

“Go!” Reagan urged.

Gripping the dumbwaiter roof, Phoenix hoisted himself upward, into the darkness. He planted his feet on the roof and began shimmying up the elevator cable. He could see Reagan below him, following close behind. Phoenix had never been able to climb more than five feet on the rope in gym class. It felt as if someone had plunged knives into his biceps. “I … can’t!”

“You will!” Inches below him, Reagan managed to reach up with one hand, gather the soles of both of his feet, and give them a powerful shove. Phoenix vaulted upward and tumbled through the wall opening and onto a cold tile floor.

He sprang to his feet, blinded momentarily by the fluorescent lights overhead. He was in a long room lined with file cabinets. “We did it, Reagan!”

Reagan jumped into the room, landing in a crouch. “Don’t just stand there — get ’em!”

She raced past Phoenix. He blinked away the brightness. At the far wall, two people sat at a bank of computers, facing away from them.

Phoenix followed, his blood pumping. The people weren’t moving. Now he could see over their shoulders, to the monitors. Each was divided into multiple views: the two prison rooms below. The corridor outside the cell. The dumbwaiter shaft.

His stomach sank. They’ve been watching us all along!

That was when he realized that another image on the screen was this room — Phoenix and Reagan running toward a camera like a mirror.

The two Vespers rose calmly and turned. They were wearing gas masks.

“Stop, drop, and roll!” Reagan shouted, throwing herself to the floor.

Phoenix nearly barreled into her. Plumes of smoke swirled out of gas jets in the wall, surrounding them both.

And all went black.

Nellie felt Phoenix Wizard’s neck. His breathing was steadier now. She tightened the tourniquet on his right arm. When they’d thrown his unconscious body down the dumbwaiter shaft, the poor kid had landed on a metal gear. And then Reagan had landed on him. The sound of the impact had been awful.

Why did I let them do it?

Nellie went over the sequence of events. She could not get it out of her mind. It was a stupid idea. She and Phoenix had talked it over as if it could work. She had convinced herself it was brilliant. Foolproof.

And then she had allowed a twelve-year-old to climb into the belly of the beast.

“How are his wounds?” Alistair asked.

“Bad,” Nellie said. “That was a hard fall. But thanks for ripping off your sleeve, Al. It’s stopping the flow. He’s going to need stitches, though.”

Fiske leaned over Phoenix and swabbed his facial scrapes with alcohol-soaked cotton. He’d stashed away some from when Nellie was shot.

“Owwww,” Phoenix moaned.

Nellie winced.

“Can’t you fix him?” Natalie said, curled up against the wall in a fetal position. “Must we hear him groaning in pain? I can’t sleep!”

Nellie spun on her. “Will do, Nat. I’ll tell Phoenix not to let his pain interfere with your beauty rest.”

“Hey, at ease, guys,” Reagan said, her voice breathy from an aching chest bruise. “I’ll sew him up, good as new … push-ups again by Sunday.”

“You can’t sew him,” Nellie said. “You broke your wrist!”

A series of odd clicks made her spin around. Ted had poked his head into the dumbwaiter’s small opening. He was making the noises with his tongue.

What’s going on with these people?

“Yo, Ted — I can bind a wound but I’m not so good with decapitations!” she shouted. “Get away from there!”

“I’m gauging the exact distance of Phoenix’s fall, by listening to the echo of the clicking,” he said, pulling out of the gap. “From the floor above to the roof of the  
elevator, I’m thinking nine feet and …” He stuck his head back in. The pole, which was still holding the gap open, shifted. With a sickening groan, the dumbwaiter inched upward.

Ted’s body twitched. His feet left the ground.

Nellie sprang to her feet and leaped across the room. She put one hand on the top of the dumbwaiter and pushed downward. With the other, she pulled Ted out  
of the hole.

He fell to the floor, gasping. The pole snapped, hurtling back into the room, end over end. It landed on the floor with a dull clank.

The dumbwaiter thumped upward, closing the gap.

“It’s a good thing you couldn’t see that, Ted,” said Reagan.

Nellie’s shoulder felt like it had been cleft open with an ax. She sank to her knees, screaming. All around her, faces blinked in and out of her vision.

“Dear girl, are you all right?” she heard Fiske ask.

“Nell, you’re a hero,” Alistair exclaimed.

A hero who sent a sweet kid to his possible death!

Tears streamed down Nellie’s cheeks. You didn’t get many chances in a place like this. You had to make them count. Not do anything stupid. Not harm others with an act you weren’t ready to take yourself.

“Please …” she said with a grimace. “Just shoot me.”

Alistair leaned close to her. “Nellie, come. You need to lie down.”

“This is my fault,” Nellie said.

“It was a calculated risk,” Alistair said. “A brave one.”

“Hey, we’ll get ’em to fix the dumbwaiter like new and send us supplies!” Reagan said.

“Are you crazy? They will not be taking requests anymore!” Nellie shouted.

“Be real, people! Exercise will get us nowhere. Trying to outwit the Vespers with tissues and bed poles — comic-book stuff! Either we kill these clowns or they will kill us!” She turned her face to the ceiling. “Come and get us, you cowards!”

A dead silence fell over the room. Nellie’s shoulder throbbed. She found herself wavering at the edge of consciousness.

Natalie uncurled herself from the floor. She stood, her eyes red and her face flushed. In a voice that seemed to well up from her toes, she shrieked:

“I want my mother!”

The sound of footsteps worked its way into Nellie’s dream.

In it, she had set out a lavish buffet in her fantasy restaurant, Gomeztibles. But now dirt-encrusted jackboots were squashing her puff pastry. They were kicking veal scaloppine onto the wall, squirting blood from the blood pudding…

“No!” she cried out.

The loud rap from the outside made her scream. She awoke into the familiar fetid air of the prison. Curled against the wall, Natalie murmured in her sleep, “Kenilworth, will you be a dear and open the door?”

“Nat? Guys?” Nellie said. “They’re here.”

The entrance slid open. It hit the inner wall with a loud whack, raining dust onto the floor.

Three men in white suits stepped in. Each was wearing a black mask and had a holstered gun. One of them threw a pile of clean uniforms on the floor. Another shoved a large sheet of cardboard at Alistair, along with a small handwritten note.

The old man read it. He looked bewildered. “You want me to copy these words onto this sheet? Whatever for?”

The man lifted his foot and drew it back to kick. Alistair flinched.

“Leave him alone!” Nellie shouted. “Al, just do it. Everyone, change into the uniforms. No questions. Now.”

When they were changed, the men gestured for them to line up by the wall.

“Dear heavens,” Fiske murmured, “if they’re going to shoot us, what is the point of the clean clothing?”

“Shows off the blood better,” Nellie drawled.

“That is not funny!” Natalie said, shaking violently as she backed against the wall.

Still doubled over from his injury, Phoenix led Ted to the wall. Ted put his arm around Natalie and stared defiantly ahead. Reagan stood next to him, arms folded. Nellie knelt in front, next to Alistair, who was still writing something on the cardboard. Fiske stood behind them, one comforting hand on each of their shoulders.

Nellie spotted a lizard skittering in through the open door. It was heading along the wall, behind the group. She was hoping Natalie the Squeamish wouldn’t notice it.

No such luck.

“Eeeeee!” Natalie’s screech was earsplitting. “That thing touched me! I’m poisoned! Get me a specialist!”

Nellie turned. The lizard was crouched by the wall, looking scared. It was beautiful, its complex black-and-white skin pattern like a mysterious, pixelated photograph. She reached over and picked it up. Its heart was beating a mile a minute. “You’re scaring it, Nat,” she remarked. “Whoa. Easy, boy. Girl. Whatever.”

It seemed to calm down in her hand. Nellie smiled. If she was going to die, her last act would be to give comfort to another living thing.

A metallic sound echoed sharply. Nellie set her jaw and looked up.

One of the guards was holding up a cell phone camera. “Say cheese,” he said.

“What the — ?” Reagan sputtered.

“Is this some sort of joke?” Fiske demanded.

“I don’t think so,” Alistair replied, lifting the cardboard sheet.

Nellie’s pulse quickened. A digital photo. Which meant someone was going to see it. Which meant a possible connection to the outer world.

Make it count.

With a sudden, crazy idea, she raised the reptile toward the camera.

And she smiled.

“Cheese.”


	4. Shatterproof

Alistair Oh would have given anything for a bite of one of his steak burritos and a sip of something refreshing. Instead he was holding a cold baked potato and a paper cup with four ounces of murky water. The Vespers had shut off the hostages’ water and reduced their food ration in retaliation for the recent escape attempt. Once a day, a sack with seven baked potatoes and a single quart of water was dropped down the shaft of the broken dumbwaiter.

“The Irish survived on a mostly potato diet for hundreds of years,” Fiske Cahill pointed out, staring grimly at the spud in his hand.

“That’s correct,” Alistair agreed. “I did a great deal of research while working on my Frozen Peanut Butter–Potato Tot Burrito.”

“How’d that sell?” Ted Starling asked. He was sitting near the damaged dumbwaiter, hoping to hear a snippet of conversation from their captors above.

“Not well, I’m afraid,” Alistair said. “But I did learn that the average Irish citizen consumed five to eight pounds of potatoes a day, and they were healthy.”

“We’re getting about a pound a day for seven of us,” Natalie Kabra pointed out. She prodded the shriveled spud on her plate, then stared in dismay at her hands. “Oh, my God! My hands look like monkey paws. I’d give anything for cream and an emery board.”

“Your hands look fine,” Ted said.

“No offense, Theodore,” Natalie said. “But you’re blind.”

Alistair cut in before the kids could start squabbling. “A bigger concern is drinkable water,” Alistair said. “We’re getting dehydrated. We’ll die of thirst long before we die of hunger.”

“Let’s try to think of the positive,” Fiske said.

“Good idea,” Natalie shot back. “Why don’t you start, Fiske?”

“Well …” Fiske trailed off.

“Can it, Natalie,” Nellie said. “If they get us fighting among ourselves we won’t have the energy to fight them.”

“In order to fight them, we have to get to them,” Reagan said, out of breath from the crunches. She started doing one-handed push-ups with her good hand, but only managed six before losing her strength.

Phoenix waved Alistair over to where he and Nellie were sitting. “Is everything okay?” Alistair asked quietly.

Phoenix leaned over and whispered into his ear. “I think Reagan is going to die.”

The hostages were waiting on the dead as well. The Vesper guards had watched the whole thing unfold on their video monitors. Reagan Holt had died from an apparent heart attack on the ninth one-handed push-up of her third set.

At first they thought she was just resting, but the boy named Phoenix rushed over and shook her.

“Reagan?” Phoenix looked at the others with grim horror. “She’s not moving.”

“Ridiculous!” Alistair Oh said. He joined Phoenix and carefully turned her over. Reagan’s face was blue. “Oh, my God!” he shouted.

The guards watched as a few of the hostages took turns administering CPR, while the others shouted for a doctor until they were all hoarse. They cried. Finally, they covered Reagan with a sheet and left her by the door.

The guards waited to go down until after they finished their poker game. Before opening the door, they pulled balaclavas over their heads and shouted for everyone to back away.

The hostages looked at them dully, spent with grief. One of the guards pointed a camera at them. The other pointed a pistol.

“Why don’t you just shoot us right now?” Fiske asked. “Get it over with.”

The man with the camera laughed. “I am shooting you … in high definition.”

“Pigs!” Nellie said.

“Cretins!” Natalie hissed.

The man shoved the pistol into his waistband and grabbed Reagan’s arms roughly. But before he could drag the corpse an inch, Reagan’s lifeless legs did an acrobatic curl, latching on to his thick neck in a scissor lock. A split second later he was flying through the air, slamming onto the concrete floor on his back. The supposedly dead girl and the others swarmed him and his partner like a pack of flying monkeys. The other Vesper guard managed to land a vicious kick to the knee of the man called Alistair, but it did no good. The guards were overwhelmed.

Reagan picked up the gun and the camera. She put the camera an inch from his face.

“Now I’m shooting you in high definition!” she cried, then dropped the camera on his chest.

The guard tried to respond, but didn’t have enough air in his lungs to speak. His partner was unconscious. The hostages helped the old man he had kicked to his feet. They filed through the concrete door, sliding it closed with a loud bang.

“This way!”

“No, this way!”

“You’re both wrong. This way!”

“Everybody just shut up!” Ted shouted.

This stopped everyone in their tracks. Ted Starling rarely spoke and never shouted. The hostages had raced through a long, dimly lit tunnel and were now standing in front of three branches that snaked off into three different directions.

“You’re making too much noise,” Ted said. “The two guards we locked in the bunker aren’t the only ones here! I heard five distinct voices. With the two guards locked in the bunker, that means there are at least seven people down here. Probably more.”

Nellie had been holding Ted’s arm, guiding him through the tunnel. “Ted’s right,” she said. “We’re out of the bunker, but we’re still trapped.”

“Maybe we should split up,” Reagan suggested.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Fiske said. “The only advantage we have is our number.”

“No, it isn’t,” Reagan said. “We have this.” She pulled the guard’s pistol from her waistband.

“I hope we won’t need that,” Fiske said.

Ted felt the walls. “Tell me what it looks like down here.”

“We’re in a rock tunnel,” Nellie answered. “It might be an old mine. There’s a lightbulb about every thirty feet, covered by a rusty metal sconce. Some of the bulbs are  
out. We’ve passed a couple of metal doors, but they were rusted closed. In front of us are three identical tunnels, left, right, and straight ahead.”

“Are there markings on the walls that say where we are or what this place is?” Ted asked.

“Nothing.”

“Put me in front of the three tunnels and let me listen for a moment without anybody talking.”

Nellie positioned him, and Ted frowned in concentration.

“There are people walking down the right-hand tunnel. I think they’re a few minutes away, which means that this underground warren is humongous. They’re not running, which means they probably don’t know we’ve escaped. I don’t get anything from the middle tunnel. But there’s definitely fresh air coming out of the tunnel on the left.”

“Then it’s left,” Alistair said.

“Let’s get out of here!” Reagan said, bounding ahead of the others.

Natalie followed with Fiske, Nellie led Ted, and Phoenix and limping Alistair brought up the rear. The guard’s kick had badly damaged Alistair’s knee, and Phoenix’s shoulder was almost the right height for Alistair to lean against. They hurried on and on, Alistair hobbling as fast as he could. The tunnel seemed endless and each noise or bump had the group whipping their heads around in fear. By Nellie’s calculation, it was almost a half a mile to the end. Reagan had outpaced everyone and was waiting for them with a blank expression when they arrived.

“It’s a dead end,” she said.

“You’re joking,” Nellie said.

“I wish.” Reagan turned and slapped the wall. “It’s solid rock.”

“Shh.” Ted pressed his ear up to the rock. “They’re coming!” he said.

“Stand behind me,” Alistair said to Phoenix.

“There’s fresh air!” Ted had his pale face pointed at the ceiling. “I can feel it! Where’s it coming from?”

They had been so busy looking for breaks in the rock wall in front of them, no one had bothered to check the ceiling. Above them was a narrow shaft with dim light filtering  
through the opening.

“If I get a good jump I can reach the ladder!” Reagan took a running start and sprang up, just managing to catch the bottom rung with her good arm. She pulled herself through  
the opening like an Olympic gymnast on a parallel bar, then dropped back to the ground. “There’s a grate. It’s twenty-five feet up, max. Let’s go!”

They boosted Phoenix up first, followed by Alistair, Ted, Natalie, and Fiske. Reagan cupped her hands to give Nellie a boost to the bottom rung.

“What about you?” Nellie asked.

“I’ll jump,” Reagan said. “But first I’m going to slow our friends down.”

Nellie shook her head. “It’s not safe. Get out of here and let me do the honors. I’m pretty good with a gun.”

“I don’t have to hit anyone,” Reagan insisted. “I’ll fire a few rounds down the tunnel and let the ricochet and noise do the rest. Besides, you can’t jump high enough to reach  
the bottom rung.”

Reluctantly, Nellie put her foot into Reagan’s cupped hands and grabbed the bottom rung. Her shoulder wound reopened and it felt like someone had splashed it with gasoline  
and set it on fire. Nellie gritted her teeth and ignored the pain and the warm blood trickling down her side.

Seven deafening gun blasts reverberated through the shaft, followed by a barrage of return fire, almost causing Nellie to lose her grip. “Are you okay?” Nellie shouted down.

“I’m fine,” Reagan replied. “Keep moving.”

Nellie tried to climb higher, but the line above her had come to a complete stop.

“Hurry!” she shouted.

“The grate’s padlocked!” Phoenix shouted back.

Reagan scrambled up behind Nellie like a monkey and handed her the pistol. “There’s one round left. Pass it up and tell Phoenix to make it count and to hurry. The Vespers will  
be here any second!”

“Have you ever fired a pistol?” Alistair asked Phoenix as he gingerly handed over the gun.

Phoenix gave him a weak smile. “Kind of,” he said. “I was on the film set of Gangsta Kronikles with Jonah. They let me shoot a pistol, but it shot blanks.”

“Hurry it up!” Reagan shouted. “They’re almost here!”

Phoenix pointed the pistol at the lock, turned his head away, and pulled the trigger.

Click.

“Safety!” Reagan shouted. “It’s on the left side by your thumb! Flick it up!”

Phoenix flicked the safety and pulled the trigger again.

Boom!

A piece of shrapnel sliced open Phoenix’s right hand. He instinctively jerked it off the rung, causing him to wobble, and then to start to fall. Alistair’s firm hand smacked into his back, stopping him from falling.

“You’ve got to get the grate open!”

But the grate was heavy, and Phoenix couldn’t lift it. They could all hear the pounding of the guards’ feet now. Natalie gave a frantic look below her, then clambered over the top of Ted to give Phoenix and Alistair a hand. It took several precious seconds before the heavy steel grate finally slapped open. The hostages piled out quickly. As Reagan hoisted herself out of the shaft, bullets whizzed through the opening. She slammed to the ground and rolled away.

“Close,” she said, looking at a smoking rip in her coveralls where a bullet had grazed her.

They were in a small clearing surrounded by giant fir trees. It was sweltering hot, but they didn’t care. For the first time in weeks, they filled their lungs with fresh air.

“Which way?” Natalie asked.

“That way.” Reagan pointed. “Downhill. You’re bound to run into a road or a river.”

“What do you mean by you’re?” Nellie asked, giving Reagan a suspicious look.

“No offense to any of you, but you’re not going to make very good time,” Reagan said. “Someone has to hang here and keep these gophers in their hole. Don’t worry. I’ll catch up with you.”

“You’re out of bullets,” Alistair reminded her.

Reagan picked up a large rock. “Ammo!” She hurtled the rock down the opening and they heard a satisfying grunt of pain.

“I’m staying with you,” Nellie said, then turned to the others. “Go, hurry!”

Fiske took Ted’s arm. “We’ll see you downhill somewhere,” he said, and the group made for the trees, Alistair limping behind him.

Reagan and Nellie were rolling two rather large boulders toward the opening when the dogs attacked them.

Reagan saw the two pit bulls streaking across the clearing first.

“Don’t move!” she shouted to Nellie.

But Nellie had already thrown a stick at the dog heading toward her. Unfortunately, the only thing the pit bull was interested in fetching was Nellie. It knocked her down and bit  
viciously into her leg.

Several heavily armed guards wearing balaclavas came running out of the woods. One of the guards called the dog off before turning on Reagan.

“Stay where you are!” Reagan pointed the pistol at them.

The guards only laughed.

“I mean it!” Reagan said.

“I can count,” the guard said. “You’re on empty.” He raised his rifle.

Reagan dropped the pistol and rushed over to Nellie.

“How bad is it?” a shaken Nellie asked.

The dog had bitten her face as well as her leg.

“We need a doctor!” Reagan shouted.

“You’re not going to get one,” the guard said. “Where are the others?”

“They went back down the shaft,” Reagan lied.

He shook his head before turning to his colleagues. “Send the dogs out. They’ll find them.”

The remaining hostages had only gone a mile and a half, most of it downhill, and Alistair was already exhausted.

“I hear water,” Ted said.

“How far?” Fiske asked.

“It’s close.”

“It’s right here!” Natalie said.

They joined her at the edge of a deep precipice. Two hundred feet below was a roaring river.

“It looks as if there’s a trail all the way to the bottom,” Natalie said. “But it’s narrow and slippery. We should wait for Reagan and Nellie before we attempt it.”

Fiske considered it, but only for a second. “No. We better go.”

He took a step out and started down the cliff.

Reagan and Nellie had been flex-cuffed and pushed into the back of a windowless panel truck.

Nellie swallowed. “Is it really bad?” Her white and black hair was matted to her head with sweat and blood.

Reagan examined her in the dim light. “Your face is a little swollen, but I don’t think it’s serious. I’m more concerned about your leg. We need to get the wounds cleaned up so  
they don’t get infected.”

“I shouldn’t have thrown the stick,” Nellie said.

“It’s pretty hard not to when a vicious animal is charging you. I learned about it in survival school. Predators expect their prey to run away or defend themselves. When that doesn’t happen it throws a wrench into their circuitry — most of the time.”

“Listen!” Nellie interrupted.

One of the guards was talking on a two-way radio outside the door, but he must have had an earphone in because they could only hear his side of the conversation. “Yes, sir … no … We have two in custody… . Nellie and the Holt girl … If that’s how you want to handle it … Let me look at a map… . I know the location. We’ll be there in a few minutes.”

The truck rumbled to life. They were on the move.

Phoenix had no idea how he had gotten to the front of the line, but it was too late to change positions now. The slippery steep path down to the river was only wide enough for one person. Alistair was about twenty feet behind him, holding on to roots sticking out from the dirt bank to keep himself steady. Fiske was next, followed by Ted and Natalie. Of all of them, Ted seemed to be doing the best at negotiating the treacherous descent. Phoenix could only guess it was because he was used to moving carefully and feeling his  
way. He waited for Alistair to catch up.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Alistair answered through clenched teeth. He was normally as neat as a pin, even in captivity, but his coverall was now soaked through with sweat and spattered  
with dirt. “I just have to move slowly, and I can’t look down. I’m a little acrophobic.”

Phoenix risked a glance at the boiling river a hundred feet below and his stomach lurched. He grabbed on to one of the roots, wondering if he suffered from fear of heights, too.

Or maybe it’s the fact that I can’t swim. Not that anyone could swim in those rapids.

“How’s your hand?” Alistair asked, pushing on despite his obvious pain.

“It’s okay,” Phoenix said, which wasn’t true. It was swollen, painful, and useless. He could only use his left hand to anchor himself in place and his heart squeezed each time he had to let go and take another step.

“Any sign of Reagan and Nellie?” Alistair asked the group behind him.

“No,” a weary-looking Natalie replied.

Phoenix was about to volunteer to go look for them when the ground lurched beneath him. The wet dirt he was standing on seemed to quiver, then peel away from the path. Phoenix lunged for the side of the cliff, but his legs windmilled under him. It was too late. His world shifted into terrifying slow motion as he began to plunge into the rapids far below.

“Nooo!” Alistair leaped forward, falling hard on his bad knee, but all he could grab was Phoenix’s injured hand.

Phoenix could hear the others screaming, but he couldn’t see them. He was dangling over the river with the gray face of Alistair Oh looming above him. He frantically scrambled for a foothold, or something to grab on to with his good hand. But there was nothing beneath him but air. The pain from his injured hand was excruciating, and the blood made it slippery. He could feel Alistair’s grip starting to fail.

“Hang on!” Alistair shouted. “I have you!”

Phoenix’s weight was pulling Alistair closer and closer to the edge. Phoenix’s eyes blurred with tears as the hideous truth struck him. If he didn’t let go, they would both die.

Alistair must have seen the resolve in Phoenix’s expression. “Don’t let go!” Alistair pleaded.

Phoenix shook his head then, closing his eyes as tightly as he could. He pictured his mom’s face, the good-night smile she gave him when she used to tuck him in.

And Phoenix let go.

“Did someone just fall?”

Natalie barely heard the question over her sobs. Incredulous, she turned her head to see a hiker standing behind her.

“Did someone fall?” he repeated urgently.

Natalie looked at him in confusion. He was in his early twenties, carrying a backpack slung over his shoulder.

“Our friend just …” She choked up again. “He …”

“Stay exactly where you are,” the man said. “I’m going to squeeze by you.”

Before she could object, he slipped nimbly by her and Ted, who was frozen in horror.

Fiske stared at the man in disbelief. “Who are you? How did you —”

“Never mind that,” the man interrupted. “The ground isn’t stable!”

Together Fiske and the hiker pulled the devastated Alistair to his feet. “I … I couldn’t hold on… .”

“It’s a long fall,” the man said, looking over the edge. “But there’s a chance he’s still alive. Can he swim?”

“I don’t know,” Fiske said, looking with a spark of hope at Ted and Natalie.

Natalie shook her head. She didn’t know, either.

“The rapids are bad through here,” the man said. “But they flatten out about a mile downriver.”

“Who are you?” Fiske asked.

“My name is Martin Holds. I was up on top when I heard someone yell.”

“You got down here pretty quickly,” Fiske said.

“I guess I did,” Martin said. “I’ve been down this path before and I’m a mountain climber.”

“Where are we?”

Martin looked confused. “You don’t know?”

Fiske shook his head.

“Baden-Württemberg.”

“Germany?” Fiske asked.

Martin nodded. “The Black Forest.” He looked at their clothes and a whisper of alarm crossed his face.

“How can we get down there?”

“The trail’s out. The only way around is to go back on top. I have a cell phone at camp. We can call for help.” He gave Alistair a sympathetic look. “If your friend survived  
the fall, we’ll find him.”

Fiske shook his head. He could not believe that Phoenix was gone.

Natalie was the first to reach the top of the trail, but she’d barely stepped to safety when a hand grabbed her, covered her mouth, and threw her to the ground. Ted was next. Fiske tried to fight the guards off, but got a smack with a rifle butt for his trouble. With his bad knee, Alistair was subdued easily. Martin Holds was last. He was able to bloody a  
guard’s nose and smash a fist into another guard’s belly before he, too, was overwhelmed.

“Saved us from coming down to get you,” the head guard said, looking down at the flex-cuffed prisoners. “Nice of you to come back up the trail.”

Fiske was too exhausted and grief-stricken to respond, but Martin Holds struggled to turn over. “What’s all this about?” he demanded.

The guard ignored him. “Where’s the boy?”

“He fell,” Fiske said.

“We’ll see.” He waved two guards down the trail. “Get up!”

When they didn’t comply, the guards yanked them roughly to their feet.

“Get your hands off me!” Martin shouted.

“He has nothing to do with this!” Fiske insisted, breaking away to force himself between the guard and Martin. “He doesn’t know anything. He was just trying to help us!”

“Wrong place at the wrong time,” the head guard said. He took his pistol out of its holster and chambered a round.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Martin shouted, his face stark with shock.

“Take them to the trucks,” the head guard ordered, jerking his head toward the hostages.

“You can’t do this!” Fiske yelled as they pushed him and the others into the woods.

“He didn’t do anything!”

A gunshot rang out behind them.

Natalie, Fiske, Ted, and Alistair each felt it in their guts.

Phoenix Wizard was too scared to scream as he fell. And he didn’t have the time. The hundred-foot fall took only two seconds, but he hit the ice-cold water faster than his mom’s car at top speed. He slammed down through the water and felt his legs crunch against the rocks at the bottom. The impact knocked the air out of him and he sucked in the frigid water. The current caught him immediately, scraping him over rocks and sucking him through whirlpools. When his lungs felt like they were about to burst, the current popped him out long enough to catch a frantic breath.

He knew his body couldn’t take much more. His muscles had gone limp, and he barely had the strength to keep his hands up to protect his head from the jagged rocks that lined the banks and loomed up out of the water. Just as his battered body and brain were about to give up, he saw a long hanging branch. It was his only chance.

If I catch it, I live. If I miss it, I die.

He lunged for the branch, but his hand started to slip. Gritting his teeth, he lunged a second time and let out a primal scream. This time his grip held and slowly, hand over hand, his shrapnel wound burning, he managed to pull himself onto shore. He lay there gasping for breath.

When Phoenix had enough strength to sit up, he assessed his situation. He guessed he must be at least a mile downstream by now. The others wouldn’t have been able to make it past where the path collapsed. They’d have to double back and find another way down to the river — if they thought he survived. Phoenix fought the urge to rush back upstream as fast as possible and search for the others. His best option was to follow the river downstream and find help for himself and his friends.

He got shakily to his feet and tried to get his bearings. For as far as he could see in every direction were giant trees, steep hills, and snowcapped mountains. How far is it to the nearest town? What if there isn’t a road downriver?

The vastness of his surroundings seemed to shake right through him. Phoenix was alone in the wilderness.

Nellie had been sobbing for more than an hour straight, her injuries all but forgotten in her grief over Phoenix. The thoughts of what she should have done pummeled her. She should never have stayed behind with Reagan. She should have kept everyone together. The others assured her that it would have made no difference, but she didn’t believe them. He was just a little kid, and he’d trusted her. She wiped the tears away with the back of her hand and took a deep breath. There were other little kids in the truck, and they needed her just as much as he had.

Get it together, Gomez. Focus on those who are still here.

“I can’t believe they shot Martin Holds,” Fiske said.

They had told her and Reagan about the hiker and his sudden murder.

If the Vespers could murder a completely innocent bystander, what do they have in mind for us?

The hostages had been in the back of the panel truck for hours without water, food, or relief. No amount of pounding, kicking, yelling, or pleading would get the guards to open the door. Reagan had suggested they rock the truck until they tipped it over.

“Why?” Natalie snapped. “So they can drag us out and stuff us into another?”

“How about just to annoy them?” Reagan offered.

Nellie managed to smile despite her grief.

“We’re being punished,” Fiske said. “As soon as we are softened up, they’ll put us back into the bunker.”

But Fiske was wrong. The truck started to move, speeding up, slowing down, bouncing them around like rocks in a tin can. Finally, hours later, it shuddered to a halt.

The door swung open.

“Get out!” yelled a massive man with a thick black beard.

Nellie climbed out, covering her eyes against the fading sunlight. By the look of it, they were still in the Black Forest. She hoped they wouldn’t have to hike. Alistair was  
barely able to stand on his own.

“We need a doctor!” Nellie said.

“If you don’t shut up, you’ll need a mortician,” a guard said. “Now move!” He pointed his rifle at a steep trail leading off into the woods.

There were twice as many guards as there had been at the other location. Some were on four-wheelers, some were on foot. All of them were heavily armed. Nellie took Ted’s hand.

“They’re not wearing balaclavas,” Reagan whispered to Nellie as they started up the trail.

Nellie was worried about that, too. The masks had been intimidating, but the lack of masks was fore-boding. It meant the Vespers no longer cared if they were recognized.

They have no intention of letting us go.

She scanned the area for a way to escape. If one of them got away, maybe they could bring back help.

“We’ll get our chance,” Reagan whispered, as if she were reading Nellie’s mind. “Right now we need to act defeated. Let them think they’ve broken us.”

“I am broken,” Nellie said. The bites on her leg and face throbbed.

“Wounded, not broken,” Ted said.

“Maybe,” Nellie said, “but I’m not so sure about Alistair.”

He could barely walk, and hadn’t said a word in over an hour. He’d fallen on a sharp rock when he lunged to catch Phoenix, taking a deep puncture to his bad knee. But  
Phoenix’s fall had hurt him much worse than the leg injury.

They trudged on for about a half a mile, until Nellie got fed up.

“That’s it!” she said, sitting down in the middle of the trail.

“Get up,” the guard with the black beard said.

She shook her head. “Nope.” He pointed his rifle at her, but Nellie stared back at him.

“You think I won’t?” he responded.

“I don’t care.” She crossed her arms and continued her defiant stare.

“Look,” the guard said, faltering. “It’s not that much farther.”

“One of us can barely walk. One of us is blind.” Nellie said. “Put them on the fourwheelers and I’ll get up.”

“Forget it.”

“Fine.” Nellie pointed at her forehead. “Squeeze the trigger.”

The guard slowly raised his rifle, but Nellie met his gaze straight on. She didn’t even blink.

The guard swore, lowered his rifle, and walked back down the trail. A couple minutes later, he came back on a four-wheeler, a second one rumbling up behind him. He pointed  
at Ted and Alistair. “You two climb on back. If you try anything funny I will shoot her.” He looked at Nellie. “Anything else?”

“Water,” Nellie said promptly.

“You’re pushing your luck.”

“If I’m given a choice between dying of thirst or a bullet, I’ll take the bullet.”

Black Beard glared at her for a second, then reached around into a side pack for six bottles of water. He got off the four-wheeler and then tossed the bottles to them one at a  
time, saving Ted for last. He smiled, and tossed Ted’s bottle rather hard.

Ted caught it with one hand. “Thanks.”

“I thought you were blind,” the astonished guard said.

“Just my eyes. My ears work fine. I heard it coming.”

“Freak,” the guard muttered.

An hour later they reached the end of the trail. Stretching through the woods for as far as they could see in both directions was a twelve-foot-high electrified fence topped by razor wire.

“What is this place?” Fiske asked.

The guards waved them through a steel gate without answering. On the other side of the fence was a gigantic compound. In the center of it was a white geodesic dome.

“Describe it for me,” Ted said.

“We’re in a clearing on top of a mountain,” Fiske said.

“Roughly the size of four football fields,” Reagan added.

“There’s a white dome in the middle,” Natalie said. “It looks kind of like a high-end igloo.”

“It would be almost impossible to get all this up here without a road,” Alistair said.

The group turned toward him in surprise. It was the first complete sentence he had uttered in hours.

At that moment, an airship carrying a cargo net with an immense load of crates appeared over the tops of the trees.

Nellie pointed at the sky. “Airship,” she said.

“Get moving!” a guard shouted.

They pushed and prodded the hostages through the dome entrance.

There were dozens of men and women inside, each one hard at work moving equipment around on forklifts, consulting digital pads, or talking on flashing Bluetooths.

Alistair looked around in awe. “They’re building something. It’s …” He paused. “What is this?”

But the guards didn’t give them time for a closer look. They hustled the hostages toward an elevator.

“Get in.”

The group shuffled inside.

“Photo op,” one of the guards said. He videotaped them for a few seconds, then nodded. The door slid closed and they shot up several floors.

They expected another set of guards to be waiting for them. Instead, the doors opened directly into a twenty-by-twenty-foot room. Directly in front of them was a floor-toceiling mirror. They watched themselves step out of the elevator.

“I assume that’s a two-way mirror,” Fiske said.

Along the left and right walls were eight cots bolted to the wall, end to end, four to a side. In the right-hand corner was a stainless steel sink and toilet.

Nellie walked closer to the mirror. One side of her face had puffed up so the skin was as tight as a balloon. She traced the ring of angry red bite marks from her hairline to halfway across her cheek.

“There’s food.” Alistair said. “Bottled water.” He was pulling out boxes from under the cots. The others rushed over to help.

“M-R-E’s?” Reagan read out the initials.

“Meals Ready to Eat. United States military meals.”

“Martin Holds said we were in the Black Forest,” Fiske said.

Everyone looked at each other in confusion.

Reagan was the first to pull open her meal. The others followed, tearing open the packets. Ted was the only one who didn’t move.

“Here,” Natalie said. “I’ll open an MRE for you.”

“Thanks,” Ted said. “But it’s not that. Maybe we should … I don’t know. Maybe we should have a moment of silence for Phoenix?”

Everyone stopped eating.

“That’s an excellent idea,” Fiske said.

They closed their eyes and bowed their heads.

Phoenix was having his own MRE. He wasn’t sure what it was, but he guessed it was a trout. It had taken him an hour to scoop it out of a shallow pool and onto the riverbank. He was exhausted and wet. He’d already seen two bears and heard what he thought was a mountain lion. He didn’t know Germany had mountain lions. The bears had ignored him, but not the sharp rocks, thorns, and branches. He had scrapes and bruises from the top of his head to his feet.

But I’m alive.

At first he had made his way downriver slowly, hoping that the others would catch up with him. When there was no sign of them, he’d started to pick up his pace, hoping to find a road or a house. So far there had been nothing but untouched wilderness. Still, the river had to lead somewhere, if nowhere else than to the ocean. If he got to the sea he could follow the shoreline to a town.

But to get there, I have to survive.

He hit the fish in the head with a rock and waited for it to stop flopping before he took a bite.

Sushi.


	5. Trust No One

Phoenix had never really been cold before.

He was cold to the very middle of every single one of his cells. His scalp and hair were like a cap knit of ice. He couldn’t see his face, but he knew that his lips were Crayola blue. Even his toenails were cold.

Never before had he shivered as long and hard as he was shivering now. And shivering was hard work. After a fitful night dozing against a tree trunk, Phoenix woke with deep  
aches in all his muscles.

As if being cold wasn’t bad enough, now it hurt to shiver.

He was wandering through an endless forest where everything looked the same.

The trauma of the kidnapping, the confrontations with an enemy he couldn’t even see, the physical and psychological deprivations of captivity, the escape and near drowning —  
his ordeal had drained his body and apparently his brain, too. 

He just kept stumbling around in a stupor.

He tried to remember the books he had read about kids surviving in the wild. Hatchet — that kid had lived for weeks in the wilderness on his own, right?

But he had had — duh, a hatchet.

In frustration, Phoenix kicked at an old rotting stump. It cracked open a little, revealing an active colony of small white grubs.

Grubs. Bears ate grubs.

Humans did, too. He’d seen it on one of those crazy food shows.

Phoenix looked more closely into the crevice. There were dozens of grubs in the dead wood, pale and soft, wriggling and writhing and squirming… . His stomach heaved at the sight of them.

He couldn’t do it.

Turning away, he took a step and stumbled on the uneven ground. His reactions dulled by hunger and fatigue and cold, he couldn’t catch himself, and fell to his knees. He felt tears coming into his eyes and let them roll down his cheeks unchecked.

At least they were warm.

Phoenix cried for a while. When he finally stopped and his vision cleared, he saw a slim stick in front of him. Almost a twig, really.

And he remembered something from another television program. On one of the nature channels. Chimpanzees and termites …

The edges of Phoenix’s poor frozen brain started to thaw a little.

I have to get out of here and get help for the others. And I’ll never be able to do that if I don’t eat something.

Phoenix picked up the stick. He chewed one end of it until it was frayed, then fanned out the wood fibers. Now it looked like a broomstick for a very tiny witch.

He pushed the stick into the crack in the stump and waited a few moments. Slowly, carefully, he pulled it out.

There were three nice, fat grubs clinging to the frayed wood. They’ll taste like chicken, he told himself.

Phoenix took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and opened his mouth.

Ted could sense the heaviness of the depression in the room. He and the other hostages had staked everything on the escape attempt. Now that they had been recaptured, they had nothing left.

It was quiet, with only the occasional sounds of Nellie and Natalie moving about as they attended to Alistair. Nellie should have been a patient herself: During the escape attempt, she had been attacked by the Vespers’ dogs.

But Alistair was worse off. He had lost a lot of blood from the deep gash in his leg, which had been cut on a sharp rock as he was trying — unsuccessfully — to keep Phoenix from going over the edge of a cliff.

The wound had gone septic. Alistair had a high fever, and the girls were using up some of their precious water ration to soak rags and place them on his body in an effort to get his temperature down.

Ted could have told them it was no use. The combination of Alistair’s advanced years and his weakened constitution left him defenseless. Ted could already smell it — the putrid odor of the infection snaking inexorably through Alistair’s system.

Then he heard an odd noise like rapid drumming, followed by Nellie’s panicked voice.

“Quick! Turn him on his side!”

Natalie’s voice: “Oh, my God, what’s happening?”

“He’s having a seizure —”

The noise was Alistair’s feet beating uncontrollably against the floor. The drumming sound slowed, then stopped as the seizure ended.

“Alistair? Alistair, it’s Nellie. Can you hear me?”

Ted heard the slow, strained gasp of Alistair’s lungs pulling desperately for air.

“Brave,” Alistair croaked. “Amy … Dan … all of you.”

“Alistair!” The anguish in Nellie’s voice made Ted flinch.

“Help him!” Natalie’s scream bounced off the walls. “Somebody, please! Hurry!”

Ted heard another long, terrible breath that made his scalp tingle and the rest of his body shudder. To him, the sound was as bad as what everyone else was seeing. Maybe worse.

The silence that followed was absolute.

Nellie had always thought of herself as the tough and feisty type. Not aggressive or mean, but determined to achieve what she set out to do, loyal to those she loved, and fierce when it came to standing up for what she thought was right.

She was utterly unfamiliar with how she was feeling at the moment.

Defeated. Exhausted. Hopeless.

But that wasn’t the worst of it. Try as she might, Nellie couldn’t summon any anger. Since the moment she was kidnapped, she had been furious with the Vespers, and that fury  
had been like a flame inside her. Keeping her going, helping her keep the others going. The flame had flickered out, extinguished by grief over the losses of Phoenix and Alistair.

I thought — I was sure — that somehow, we’d all get out of this alive.

Not that she hadn’t been truly frightened any number of times. But deep down inside, it was in her nature as both a fighter and an optimist to expect good to prevail in the end. Now she knew that, however this ended, Alistair and Phoenix would not be part of it.

Nellie looked around the room and saw her mood reflected in each of the others. Fiske lay stretched out on the floor, eyes closed most of the time. When they were open, he stared out into space, looking at nothing. Natalie sat with her back against a wall, her knees drawn up in a fetal position, hunched over and picking at her cuticles until they  
bled. Reagan was no longer working out. Instead she paced the bunker restlessly, prowling back and forth with no purpose, muttering to herself, driving them all crazy.

And Ted … well, it was hard to tell with Ted.

Because I can’t look into his eyes. 

Nellie hadn’t realized before spending all this time with Ted, how much she “read” people through the expressions in their eyes. She looked at him now. He was sitting next to Natalie.

Huh — I can read him. I can tell that he’s not just sitting there. He’s thinking — his brain is really working.

Nellie walked over to Ted and sat down on the other side of him.

“I’ve remembered something,” Ted said slowly. “The hiker. His voice — I was sure I’d heard it before, but I wasn’t sure where at first.”

He paused. Nellie felt her neck muscles tense up.

“And?” she prompted him. She clenched her fists to stop herself from shaking Ted to knock the memory loose.

“Last summer I went out west with Sinead. She wanted to get away from everything. We stayed in the Olympic Mountains, in Washington State. We didn’t do much, just hung  
out, went for some walks. It rained a lot, but that was okay — we didn’t have any real plans.

“On one of the walks, we met this guy named Riley McGrath. I think Sinead kinda liked him. He invited us to go rock climbing, but I didn’t want to go. She took me back to the lodge where we were staying and went on her own.” Ted turned his face toward Nellie.

“That’s who the hiker was. Riley McGrath. So why would he say he was Martin Holds?”

Nellie tried to clear the fog of confusion from her brain. “Ted, are you sure? I mean, a lot of people’s voices probably sound kind of alike —”

“Maybe to you,” he said. “Not to me. Think of it this way. You might know two people who look similar, say, medium height, dark hair, average build, glasses. You can still tell them apart, right? No problem?”

“Sure.”

“That’s what it’s like for me with voices. It was the same guy.”

A tiny spark of hope ignited inside Nellie. She grabbed Ted’s shoulder. “Maybe this tells us where we are! It could be a huge lead, Ted!”

Ted nodded slowly. “It’s just too much of a coincidence, you know?”

Nellie got to her feet. “We’ve got to let Amy and Dan know somehow.”

The only way to communicate with them was through the transmissions sent by the Vespers. Which were never sent for the convenience of the hostages.

With one hand in a fist, she punched her other palm several times. Think. Think.

Figure out a way to say it so they get the message. And then we’ll just have to wait — I HATE all this waiting around!

The spark inside her flared.

Nellie was mad again.


	6. Day of Doom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm gonna see if I can get a hold of all the pictures. If not, this ends here.

The breaths still came hard and fast for some. And the tears were still falling.

Alistair Oh had been dead only a short time and the grief still lay heavy and hurtful over all the remaining hostages. Understanding death was always hard.

Premature death in close proximity was harder still to comprehend.

Nellie Gomez rubbed her healing but still painful shoulder and brushed her filthy hair out of her face. It felt like years had passed since she had been snatched off the streets of Paris. She wasn’t sure exactly how much time had elapsed, but she had a sinking feeling that the odds of their ending up as Alistair had were growing by the minute.

She looked around at the other hostages.

Reagan Holt, normally the Energizer Bunny of the Tomas clan, was sitting on her haunches staring at her dirty sneakers.

It looked like her batteries had finally run out.

Natalie Kabra, the fashion queen of the Lucian branch, sat looking equally moody and depressed.

Nellie sort of blamed Natalie for her wound. After all, it had appeared the Vespers were going to shoot Natalie first, but a voice ordered them not to. So they had shot Nellie instead.

Thanks a lot, Nellie thought as she gazed with unfriendly eyes at Natalie. But then again, Isabel had also shot Natalie in the foot when they were all after the 39 Clues. And Natalie had managed to get the bullet out of Nellie’s shoulder when Phoenix had failed to do so. Okay, she had been able to do it because she was a great eyebrow-plucker and could wield tweezerslike nobody’s business. And her eyes had been closed the entire time she’d searched for the bullet because she’d been totally grossed out by the gunshot wound.

But still, she had gotten the bullet out.

And she’s probably missing her brother, Ian, thought Nellie. But I’m missing a lot of people, too.

Nellie’s gaze moved to the spot that Phoenix Wizard normally would have occupied. Phoenix had died while attempting to escape. At least he was free from the Vespers, but Nellie missed him a lot.

She next looked at Ted Starling. The teenager gazed at nothing, literally. Badly injured during an explosion when looking for the 39 Clues, Ted could see only light and dark, nothing else. But he was plucky and had held up as well as any of the hostages.

The only other adult hostage Nellie worried about was Fiske Cahill. He and Nellie were the guardians of Amy and Dan, and Fiske was the de facto head of the Madrigal branch and nearly seventy. Long known as the Man in Black, and a tough, tenacious dude, he looked, to Nellie, defeated.

I suppose I look beaten to everyone else, she thought.

Nellie was about to say something to Fiske when they heard the footsteps approach. Like wounded animals, each of the hostages instinctively hunkered down and slid as deeply into the shadows as they could. None of them ever took it as a good sign when that door opened.

All of them probably had the same thoughts running through their minds: Is this it? Is today the day we die?

The door swung open. A voice called out, “We’re moving you. Get up!”

The hostages all slowly rose together as though tethered by rope.

Fiske Cahill said, “Where are we going?”

The voice said condescendingly, “What does it matter to you, old man?”

“Come close enough and I’ll show you how well an old man can kick your butt.”

Nellie smiled. Now that was the Fiske Cahill she hoped still existed.

The voice said, “But before we leave, you have one more thing to do.”

“What?” blurted out Natalie.

“You get to say good-bye to your little friends, Amy and Dan Cahill.”

This statement sent chills through all the hostages. Were they going to die? Or were Amy and Dan?

But one of them, Ted, saw an opportunity, even with his very bad eyesight.

The hostages trudged out of their prison, unsure of what the future would hold. As Fiske Cahill passed one of the guards, the man said, “You talk big for an old fart.” It was the same man who had told them they were moving.

“Big talk this,” replied Fiske as he whipped around and landed a side kick right into the guard’s gut, sending him flying back against the wall and slumping to the floor. Fiske bent down and whispered to the battered man, “That was for Alistair.”

As other guards converged on him, Fiske straightened and said simply, “Terribly sorry about that. Lost my balance. Happens to old farts all the time.”

He walked on, with his head held high.

“I see,” said Vesper One. “And have you picked the hostage you want to kill yet?”

The lights came back on and Ian could see all the hostages blinking and staring at him with unfriendly eyes. He had no idea where they had come from.

“Have you, Ian?” said Vesper One with amusement. “Perhaps poor little blind Ted Starling?” A spotlight hit Ted and he looked away. “Or maybe the old fart, Fiske Cahill?” The spotlight swung to Fiske, who just stood there defiantly. He yelled, “Just come close enough and I’ll show you how hard an old fart can hit.” Vesper One continued, “Or perhaps your own dear sister?” The spotlight beam landed on Natalie. She put up a hand to shield her eyes from the brightness.

“I . . . I haven’t quite made up my mind yet,” said Ian lamely.

“Well, you’ll need to do that soon. Wouldn’t want to disappoint your dear chief Vesper mother.”

The spotlight was turned off and the room went dark again.

Everyone waited a bit, but the voice did not come back.

Fiske Cahill called out, “Ian, you lay one hand on any of us and I’ll knock you right out of your Prada.”

“For your information, I’m wearing Ralph Lauren,” snapped Ian. He drew closer, groping in the darkness. He whispered, “And it was just an act. I’m on your side.”

“Right!” barked Nellie. “We all heard what you said about killing one of us.”

"I had to tell my mother that or she never would have allowed me in here. I wanted to get Vesper One and my mother doubting each other instead of focusing on us.”

Ted whispered, “That’s actually a smart strategy.”

They all drew closer in the dark until they were standing next to one another.

“Is everyone okay?” asked Ian.

“Everyone except Alistair. He’s dead,” said Fiske.

“I know,” replied Ian quietly. “It’s simply shocking. What did he die of?”

“Being brutalized by a bunch of cowards,” snapped Fiske.

“Is Amy okay?” asked Nellie anxiously.

“I know that she barely survived an attack from my mother.”

“What are you doing here?” barked Fiske.

“Evan and I flew out here to join up with Phoenix. He got a call through to Attleboro when we were there.”

“Phoenix made it out? He’s okay?” exclaimed Reagan. “We thought he died in the fall.”

“He was perfectly all right until we all were captured by the Wyomings and Sandy. Hamilton and Jonah are prisoners, too,” said Ian miserably. “They’re locked in a room close to this one.”

“Hamilton?” said Reagan. “Is he all right?”

“For now. Like all of us. But I can’t believe that will last. Something’s going on out there. Planes are having a hard time flying. I think it might be tied to the Vespers’ plan somehow.” flying. I think it might be tied to the Vespers’ plan somehow.”

“Where are Amy and Dan?” whispered Nellie.

“On their way. At least I think they are. The only question is, will they be in time?”

The large truck barreled down the road.

Inside the back were the hostages, chained to the truck wall. They all felt every bump and every swerve. Some of them looked sick to their stomachs. They had been riding in the back of the truck for what seemed like days, but actually had been about fifteen hours. After one nauseating lurch, which slammed him against the side of the truck, Ted Starling threw up.

“Oh, gross,” complained Natalie as she tried to move away from the pile of sick on the truck floor. “That’s disgusting.”

“Better get used to seeing it,” said Fiske, who looked very pale indeed. “I think before this ride is over we’re all going to vomit.”

As they went over the top of a hill, the truck almost seemed to take flight.

Several of the hostages clutched at their stomachs.

Ian said, “I think I’m going to be sick, too.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” said his sister. “Lucians don’t get sick to their stomachs.”

As the truck gave another sickening lurch, Natalie turned green and threw up. She stared down in horror at the pool of puke.

“You might want to check your Lucian status,” moaned Nellie.

Nellie wasn’t nauseated, but she’d been getting slammed around with the truck’s movements, and her wounded shoulder had taken most of the impacts. She clutched at it with her hand, as though trying to push the pain away.

“I bet it’s Cheyenne driving,” complained Hamilton. “She’s a psycho. She’s probably deliberately hitting every pothole she can just to make us suffer.”

“Of course she is,” snapped Evan. “She’s a Vesper. She’s evil. It’s what evil people do.”

Reagan said, “It’s cold in here. I suggest that we all run in place and do push-ups to keep warm. Plus it’ll keep our energy up.”

Fiske held up the shackles they all had on. “And exactly how would you like us to run, Reagan, dear, with these bloody things on?”

“That’s why I said run in place.”

“And fall over and knock ourselves out?” snapped Nellie. “I think the healthiest thing for us to do is stay still.”

“And perhaps we can just all shut up, too,” said Evan heatedly. He was still obviously upset about being captured.

“I can sing a song,” offered Jonah. “Word.”

“No!” everyone shouted in unison.

Evan eyed him threateningly. “Not one note, not one lyric, or I’ll cream you.”

“Why so hostile all of a sudden, bro?” asked Jonah innocently.  
“Oh, I don’t know, maybe being carried by a roller coaster to my death might be a reason,” snapped Evan. “So just sit there and do not even hum.”

Ted Starling sat in a far corner saying nothing. He was concentrating on every sound he could. He was trying to take in any information that could help him determine where they were being taken.

He didn’t know if it would do any good, but it wasn’t like he had anything else to do right now.

Fiske pulled angrily on his shackles.

Each of the hostages was tied together with the same long chain. The chain had been run through a large bolt in the wall of the truck. When Fiske pulled on the chain once more, it hit the side of the truck and dug a divot out of the wood.

Fiske stared at this divot and then said, “Listen up, everyone, I’ve got an idea.”

“You have a song you want me to sing?” said Jonah. “We could do a duet. I’ll be baritone. Just follow my lead.”

“I don’t have a song, you twit. I have a plan. To escape.”

In the rear of the truck, Fiske was urging the others on.

All the hostages were slapping the side of the truck where the bolt was located with their length of chain. The floor was littered with wood and composite chips carved out of the truck wall by their energetic thrusts.

Fiske said, “Keep going. We’re almost there. Once we work the bolt out of the wall, we’re free.”

Jonah, who was wearily hitting his section of chain against the wall, said, “Free? Bro, we’re still locked in a truck.”

“True,” said Fiske. “But now we’re chained up in a locked truck. When we’re no longer chained and they have to open the truck to let us out, the truck is no longer locked. Get it?”

“Got it.” Jonah started whacking the wall with renewed energy.

Even Nellie, with her wounded shoulder, was taking her turn with the wall. She grimaced every time she hit the wall with her part of the chain, but she doggedly kept going.

Hamilton and Reagan were the most aggressive of all. They were slamming their chains against the side of the wall so hard it seemed like they were in danger of knocking the truck over on its side.

Fiske finally grabbed Hamilton and said, “Appreciate the max effort, son, but we are trying to do this somewhat on the sly.”

A sweaty-faced Hamilton said, “Oh, right. Sure.”

They proceeded, but at a somewhat moderated pace.

Fiske stepped back and studied the loosening bolt and then the rear door of the truck. It was locked, that he knew. He had heard the lock slide into place when Casper had lowered the overhead door.

He ran his gaze along the distance between the bolt and the door. He made some calculations in his head. Things might come together nicely. He was very much looking forward to knocking Casper Wyoming right on his butt. He figured he could just run Cheyenne over with the truck. Sandy he would string up to the tallest pole he could find, wrapped with metal, and let a stray bolt of lightning finish him off. These thoughts made him smile.

And they also gave him hope. And energy.

He picked up his length of chain and began gouging at the wood.

Nellie looked at him and smiled weakly. “Do you think we have a chance?” she asked.

He smiled grimly back at her. “I’ll let you know as soon as we get this bolt out. When we do, then I think it’s time for something.”

“Time? Time for what?”

“Payback,” said Fiske grimly. He and Nellie beat the sides of the wall harder than ever. Then Fiske suddenly stopped and listened.

“Quiet, everyone. Stop what you’re doing.”

They all froze and stared at him.

Fiske listened more closely.

Ted Starling had sensed it before anyone else.

“We’re slowing down,” he said. “I think we’re almost at our destination.”

Fiske roared, “Go! Go! As hard as you can. Do it.”

They all started smashing the wall as hard as they could. The bolt started to come out of the wall.

The truck started slowing down more.

“Go! GO!” shouted Fiske.

Hamilton reared back and gave the bolt one more mighty whack.

It fell to the floor.

They all looked at one another.

“We’re free,” gasped Nellie.

“Not quite,” said Fiske.

The truck had stopped abruptly, throwing them all forward.

“Now what?” asked Ian fearfully.

They all heard it.

Doors opening and then thumping closed.

“They’re coming,” hissed Natalie as she drew back from the door.

“What do we do?” Nellie asked, looking at Fiske.

Fiske took charge. “Listen to me and listen very carefully. We only have one shot to get this right.”

They all drew around as he began to explain their plan of attack.

He unlocked the padlock and pushed up the truck door.

“AAAAGGGHHH!”

The hostages, led by Hamilton, Evan, Reagan, and Fiske, leaped out, still chained together, and fell on top of Sandy, Cheyenne, and Casper. When Casper stood and started swinging, Reagan leveled him with a wicked spin kick.

“Sweet,” exclaimed Reagan as Casper crashed to the floor. “Been wanting to try out that move, doofus.”

Cheyenne jumped to her feet and caught Evan with a jab and an uppercut. He went down, but Hamilton slammed into Cheyenne and sent her flying against the wall. She hit it and slid down, unconscious. Hamilton towered over her and flexed his biceps.

“Man, that felt good,” he said. “What I live for. Winning and creaming people.” Casper got back up only to be leveled by a right cross and vicious uppercut thrown by Fiske Cahill. As Casper collapsed backward, unconscious, Fiske said, “Been wanting payback since that little thrashing you gave me in Switzerland, you punk.”

Sandy got to his feet and ran, but Fiske, using his wrapped chain as a lasso, tossed it around Sandy’s neck and jerked him backward.

“Haven’t finished with you yet, old boy,” said Fiske. “It’s been a while since I had the opportunity to pummel someone closer to my own age.”

Sandy turned to him, gurgling, his eyes popping as he gripped the chain.

“What’s that you say?” asked Fiske mockingly. “Oh, you want me to hit you very hard in the mouth? Delighted.”

Fiske slammed his fist into Sandy’s face and the world-class (in his own mind) meteorologist slumped to the ground, knocked out cold.

“We need a key!” called out Nellie, who had been flung all over the place while the others were fighting. She held her injured shoulder and was trying hard not to scream in pain.

Hamilton dug into Cheyenne’s jacket pocket and held up the key to the shackles. “Got it.”

“Someone’s coming,” warned Ted, who’d been listening intently for this very thing.

“Quick,” said Fiske. “Out this way. We can unlock the chains later.”

He looked down once more at Sandy and gave him an extra kick in the side. “That’s for Alistair, you evil little man!”

They rushed through a doorway and entered a rock tunnel. To the left, they heard the sounds of people approaching.

Still all chained together, they headed to the right with Hamilton in the lead. He was so tall and his strides so long that some of the shorter people fell to the floor.

“Let’s get in sync,” said Reagan. “Or we’ll just be captured again. Come on, one-two, one-two, one-two. Left-right, left-right.”

They left the tunnel, turned right, and kept going. Once they could no longer hear the sounds of people rushing down the tunnels, they stopped and Hamilton unlocked the chains with the key he’d taken from Cheyenne. They all looked around while they caught their breath.

“Where are we?” asked Nellie.

The other nine hostages, suddenly free, but far from safe, looked at one another. 

“Feels like we’re inside a mountain,” noted Ian.

His sister nodded. “It’s so cold and dark.”

“But not completely dark,” observed Fiske. “There are low-level lights throughout these tunnels. That is not naturally occurring. There must be some source of power, possibly a generator.”

“But who would have a generator inside a mountain?” asked Evan.

Fiske looked at Phoenix. “Phoenix, you got away before. Where were we?”

“In Washington State,” answered Phoenix. “Somewhere in the Cascade Mountains.”

“So why move us from those mountains to wherever we are now, inside another mountain?” wondered Nellie.

Ted said, “I think we’re somewhere in the Rockies.”

They all looked at him.

“How can you know that?” asked Hamilton skeptically.

“I counted the seconds in the trip. And one of the wheels on the truck had an imperfection. I could feel and hear the resulting bump and squeak. I calculated the revolutions of the wheels and arrived at the approximate speed we were being driven. Multiplying that by the length of the trip equaled roughly thirteen hundred miles. That’s about the distance between Seattle and Denver, give or take. That is if we were heading east. But heading south in that direction would not really put us in a mountain range. And north would be in Canada with the same issue.”

“But why hold us in the Cascades and then move us to the Rockies?” asked a bewildered Jonah. “It makes no sense.”

“It obviously makes sense to someone.”

“Someone like Vesper One,” said Nellie grimly.

Fiske took charge. “All right. We have gained our freedom, but we’re still in great danger. They’ll know by now that we have escaped. They will be searching for us. They will know the layout of these tunnels better than we do. I think the best strategy is to split up. That way if we are captured, they won’t get us all, at least in one fell swoop.”

“Sounds like a plan we can execute,” said Reagan in her pumped-up, kick-butt Reagan way. “So let’s divvy up the assets and go nail some Vespers.”

Fiske looked them all over. “Okay, there are ten of us, so we’ll go five and five. I’ll lead one group. Ian, you take the other.”

Reagan looked incredulous. “You didn’t pick me as a leader?”

Fiske smiled sweetly. “Dear Reagan, I know your propensity to fight, as well as your brother’s, and your desire to be at the forefront of the action. But the leader must stay back, not be captured or hurt. I didn’t want either of you to have to work against your own very natural instincts.”

Reagan brightened at this explanation. “Okay, then. Good thinking.”

“Yeah,” added Hamilton. He smacked his fist into his palm. “I am definitely ready to bust some Vesper heads.”

Fiske split them into groups. He took Nellie, Reagan, Jonah, and Ted with him. That left Hamilton, Evan, Phoenix, and Natalie to go with Ian. Before they headed out in separate directions Fiske said, “Whatever happens, I want you to know how very proud I am of all of you. The bravery you’ve shown. No person could ever have any people better than you in a dangerous situation. It has been my honor to serve with you.”

Some of them blinked back tears. Even Reagan and Hamilton looked misty-eyed.

Fiske continued, “This will not be easy. It will be very difficult, in fact. Whatever the Vespers are planning, it will not be good for the world. We must do all we can to save it. Even if we have to die for it.”

Fiske looked at them all. “Good luck.”

The two groups set off in opposite directions to save the world.

“This way,” called out Fiske. They had been moving down passageways for the last twenty minutes.

Fiske had been searching for a way out at first, but realized that his best bet was to try to find some of the Vespers. If they could overpower them, they not only would have a decent shot at discovering what deadly plan the Vespers had, but also an exit. Otherwise, he was afraid they could wander in this maze for years. The five former hostages moved down the hall as quietly as possible. Fiske knew that if a fight took place he could count on Reagan to more than hold her own. The Tomas branch had its share of muscle, endurance, and athleticism. And Jonah, he supposed, could start singing. That might actually scare the Vespers off. Fiske knew that Jonah was an international superstar, but Fiske was not his core audience, meaning he was older than thirteen and not a girl.

However, in a fight, Ted would be helpless. And the same was true for the injured Nellie. Fiske thought, Well, old boy, you’re just going to have to pick up the slack.

They came to a pentagon-shaped room that had five tunnels, including the one they were in, bleeding off from it.

Fiske stopped and the others halted behind him.

“Which way?” asked Reagan.

Nellie studied the different options. “They all look the same.”

“But no doubt where they lead will not be the same,” noted Fiske.

“Should we split up further?” asked Jonah. “There are four possibilities and five of us?”

Fiske considered this for a moment but then shook his head after glancing at Nellie and Ted.

“We’ve diluted our numbers enough. We stick together.”

“So do we eenie-meenie-miney-mo it?” asked Nellie in frustration.

“Might be as good as anything,” answered Fiske.

He performed the exercise and ended with the tunnel to their immediate left. “Let’s go, troops,” he said with far more confidence than he actually was feeling.

They headed down this passageway for what seemed like miles, although by Fiske’s calculation it was only about twenty-four feet.

“I think I see a brighter light up there,” said Reagan.

Fiske had seen it, too. 

“Okay,” he began in a low voice. “This may be the moment of truth. If there are Vespers in that room ahead, then we need to be prepared to fight. Reagan and I will lead the way. Jonah, your job is to protect Nellie and Ted.”

Reagan said, “I thought you said leaders stayed back from the fight?”

“A little white lie,” replied Fiske.

“Sorry.”

“And I don’t need song-boy to protect me,” Nellie said indignantly. “I can fight.”

“Not with a wounded shoulder,” pointed out Reagan.

“I’ve still got one good arm and two good legs,” she said stubbornly.

“And I can fight, too,” said Ted.

Fiske looked at him, but said nothing. However, he was thinking, Dear boy, you can barely see.

“All right,” he said. “I’m sure we’ll all encounter some action. But let’s keep quiet so surprise will be on our side.”

They moved forward slowly.

Fiske was trying to visualize in his mind’s eye how a potential battle would play out. It was good to be prepared. He would use every tool at his disposal and fight as dirty as he possibly could in order to beat the Vespers.

They reached the end of the passage.

Fiske held up his hand and they all froze.

He took a few more steps forward and peered around the corner.

What he was looking at was a large room with a very high ceiling. So tall was it, in fact, that Fiske could not, in the poor light, actually see the ceiling. He looked all around the room — well, as much of it as he could see. It appeared to be empty.

But then again, it could be a trap.

He inched forward some more. He became dimly aware of a large object that was located in a darkened corner of the room at a point farthest away from him. He looked behind him and observed that the others were following closely.

“Well, I guess it’s now or never,” said Fiske to himself.

He stepped fully out into the room and prepared to be attacked on all sides. 

Nothing happened.

The others formed a ring around him.

“What is that?” Reagan asked, pointing to the far corner.

“I was thinking the same thing,” replied Fiske. “I say we find out, shall we?”

They cautiously walked in that direction. As they drew closer the object came into sharper relief.

Its scale was enormous. It must have been fifty feet high and built of metal, wood, and what looked to be sophisticated composites. To Fiske, it looked like an ancient weapon of mass destruction that a Roman army might have deployed in battle. But it also looked like a science experiment gone very weird, with long copper tubes weaving in and out of a large, wide, mostly metal body that was rectangular in shape. There were pieces of oddly shaped metal and wood sticking out here and there like appendages that had come as afterthoughts. There were power coils and generator lines and an assortment of objects that Fiske didn’t even recognize.

“It looks like something I used to build with my Lego sets when I was a kid,” observed Jonah. “Only a lot bigger, no uniform parts, and with a lot less color.”

“Meaning it doesn’t look anything like a Lego set,” snapped Nellie.

As they stood there, they all suddenly heard the low hum emanating from the device. Fiske put out his hand and touched the core.

“Warm,” he noted. “But not exceedingly so. Whatever it is, someone has turned it on. But it doesn’t seem at full power yet.”

Nellie stared up at the huge creation. “It’s creeping me out. It looks like it might come alive at any moment and crush us.”

“It does sort of look like that,” agreed Fiske. He stepped closer and peered at a spot about midway up the metal core. “But look there.”

They all stared at where he was pointing.

There was a small niche built into the machine. But there was nothing in it. 

Jonah looked more closely. “It looks like something is supposed to be inserted in there.”

The others looked at him as Jonah’s eyes suddenly bulged.

Nellie said, “Jonah, what is it?”

He answered in a quavering voice, “This must be the Doomsday device!” He pointed to the niche. “There was a drawing of Amy’s ring in the plans we found in Syracuse. It looked like it would fit right in there.” “The ring?” said Fiske. “What would the ring do?”

“Well, I call it a ring, but I think it was more properly described as a gear.”

“That’s exactly what it is,” said a voice.

They all turned to see a young man in a black suit standing within fifteen feet of them. He was holding something.

He said, “One more piece to the puzzle. The final piece, in fact.”

Fiske shouted, “Who the bloody hell are you?”

Nellie said, “I recognize the voice. From the room where we met up with Ian.”

Fiske looked wildly back at the young man. “This can’t be. You? You’re...”

“Damien Vesper. Not exactly at your service. More precisely, at your demise.”

Nellie said in a frightened voice, “Then you’re Vesper One?”

“I am indeed,” said Damien. “And I hope you hold my image in your mind as your last dying thought.”

Fiske looked swiftly around. He could sense others in the darkness, creeping toward them. He took one step back. The others followed his lead. Buying some time, Fiske said, “So, let me guess. This little thing here is your invention?”

“Mine and Archimedes’,” said Damien. “One must give credit where credit is due.”

“And what does it do?” asked Fiske.

“I’m Vesper One,” said Damien smugly. “Or Damien Vesper, if you prefer. So what do you think it does? Make everyone happy and fulfilled?”

“So mass destruction, then,” said Fiske wearily. “Why can’t you Vesper types ever think outside the box? It’s always plague this, complete annihilation that. It really is very tiresome. Have you ever considered therapy or, at the very least, anger management?”

Damien was unfazed by the sarcasm and didn’t respond. But what he did not realize was that Fiske had coiled up the long chain that had been used to immobilize them in the truck and wound it around his waist. Now his hand dipped to the chain and gripped one end of it. Damien said, “And now I think it’s time for you to become hostages once more. But I can promise you that your imprisonment this time will be brief.”

“Oh, yeah?” piped in Reagan. “And why is that?”

“Because there is no reason to imprison the dead,” replied Damien nastily.

“Touché,” said Fiske. “So very predictable of you, Dame.”

The figures in the darkness rushed forward at the same time that Fiske uncoiled the chain and, using it like a whip, felled four of the guards who had emerged to try to capture them.

“Go, Cahills!” screamed Fiske. “Fight to the death!!”

All five of them, including the mostly blind Ted Starling and the wounded Nellie, charged ahead to try to do just that.

Fiske Cahill was fighting like a man thirty years younger. He had destroyed three of Vesper One’s men but others kept coming.

As he looked around he saw that his group was slowly losing the battle.

Nellie had struggled valiantly with one Vesper, but he had pounded her on her injured shoulder and she was now facedown on the floor with her hands zipcuffed behind her.

Reagan was fighting like a demon, leveling every Vesper that came within her reach. But Fiske watched helplessly as another Vesper Tasered the teenage tornado and she instantly dropped to the floor and out of the fight.

Jonah had been subdued almost immediately, although he kept trash-talking after his hands were bound behind him until one of the Vespers stuffed a rag in his mouth. Jonah’s last words before this happened were “You wanna ’nother piece of me, bro?”

And poor Ted was swinging randomly at Vespers who surrounded him. They laughed at his awkward attempts to hit them until one drew too close and Ted connected and knocked him flat on his butt. Then they quickly subdued him.

Fiske fought on, the last man standing. But as a dozen Vespers formed a circle around him he knew it was only a matter of time. He looked behind him at the behemoth device.

If he could somehow sabotage it...?

He turned, ran straight at a slight gap in the Vespers’ defensive arc, broke through by flattening two Vespers with one spin kick, and sprinted flat out at the device.

A single shot rang out.

Fiske Cahill gasped and fell to the floor.

Fiske lay motionless for a long moment.

The pain in his shoulder burned like someone had pierced him with a sword covered with molten lava. That’s what it felt like to be shot. He rolled over and rose to his knees, feeling slightly nauseous. He looked up to see everyone staring at him. Nellie gazed grimly at him and touched her own gunshot wound. Reagan, the effects of the Taser wearing off, stared at him with semi-paralyzed features. Ted could not see him, but apparently could sense what had happened.

“Fiske?” he said. “Are you okay?”

Jonah just grunted with the rag stuffed in his mouth.

Fiske managed to say, “I’m all right.”

However, he felt far from all right.

“For now,” said Vesper One as he walked into the circle formed by his men. “But not for long,” he added, the smoking gun still in his hand.

Fiske stared up at him. “You know, for an evil genius type with delusions of grandeur, I really would have pegged you for being a bit longer in the tooth. You look like you’re about to go to the prom for the first time, not that any decent girl would condescend to go with a creepy punk like you.”

Vesper One’s expression remained unchanged. “Sarcasm flowing from a defeated foe. Interesting. I guess if it makes you feel better, go right ahead.”

“You don’t want me to really get started. I might never stop.”

Vesper One gazed at him with pity. “Oh, you’ll stop. Precisely when I want you to.” He pointed the muzzle of his pistol at the center of Fiske’s broad forehead.

“Shoot an unarmed man? Hardly sporting of you.”

“But I’m not sporting. I’m a Vesper. I win any way I can.”

“Actually, so do the Cahills.”

This comment had not come from Fiske.

It had come from Amy Cahill.

The next instant Vesper One’s minions were being overwhelmed by this infusion of fresh troops.

Jake brought down two of them all by himself, pounding them until they collapsed into unconsciousness.

Hamilton moved through the Vespers like a threshing machine, kicking and punching any of them within reach. When one tried to Taser him, he grabbed the device and zapped the man instead.

Amy and Dan stood back-to-back and took on all comers. Kicking and punching and biting when necessary, they managed to subdue a half dozen Vespers in a matter of minutes.

Evan had one Vesper in a headlock when the shot rang out. At first Evan didn’t seem to have noticed that he’d been hit. Then he looked down at his chest and saw the blood flowing from the hole there. He fell to the floor. The others were so busy fighting they didn’t notice.

Ian and Natalie were kicking and punching as they worked their way to the Doomsday device. Natalie finally broke through a column of Vespers and ran for it, after picking up a large metal bar one of the Vespers had dropped. She swung it back, ready to deliver a crushing blow to the huge machine.

Ian watched in admiration until he noticed the blue sparks spewing from the base of the device.

“Natalie, no!”

She didn’t hear him.

She swung the pole and hit her target squarely in the middle. It did no damage. To the device. Natalie stood there, momentarily frozen as the electrical current built up in the device swept through her.

Ian watched, paralyzed by panic as his sister was hit by the current. He didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t exactly fathom what was happening.

Then the surge of power from the Doomsday device ceased, and the metal bar fell away. Natalie moaned once and fell to the floor.

“No!” screamed Ian as he fought his way to his sister.

He knelt next to her. Her eyes were open. He felt for a pulse. There was none. He started performing CPR. He pumped and pumped her chest, trying to restart her heart. He kept checking her pulse. 

Finally, he sat back, exhausted. He stared down at his sister. The truth was something that Ian could not comprehend, though it was crystal clear.

Natalie Kabra was dead.

As the fighting continued all around him, Ian sat there on his haunches overcome with anguish. He had just been reunited with his sister and now he had lost her. He couldn’t quite understand that she would not be coming back. How could she be dead? She was always so much alive. In everything she did. Ian had so looked forward to growing up with her.

They were all each other had. All the family left of the Kabras.

He reached down and touched her cheek. It was still warm. He touched her hand. It felt so limp, but instead of pulling away, Ian gripped it more tightly, as though his warmth could bring her back.

But of course it couldn’t. The dead could not come back.

The laughter reached Ian’s ears a moment later. He looked over and saw Vesper One in the far corner. He held up a device that looked like a remote. “A shocking experience for her, wouldn’t you say, Ian?” crowed Vesper One.

Enraged, Ian slowly rose, smashed his way through two Vespers, and charged straight at Vesper One.

“You die, right now,” yelled Ian. He had never truly imagined killing anyone until right this instant. Now he could not exist another second while this man lived.

“So many have said, and yet here I am,” taunted Vesper One. In another moment he was gone.

Ian couldn’t believe his eyes. He looked around everywhere.

How had he disappeared?

Amy came running over to him. “I’m so sorry, Ian.” The tears in her eyes matched the ones in his. She had obviously seen Natalie’s body.

Ian panted. “I will get him. If it’s the last thing I do. I will get him.”

“We’ll get him, Ian. All of us.”

“All of us who are left,” he amended bitterly, staring over at his dead sister.

They turned back to the fight.

That’s when Amy saw him.

Evan, on the floor, blood flowing out of his chest.

“NO!” screamed Amy. She ran toward Evan, flooring a Vesper with a kick to the head as she zipped past.

She reached Evan and knelt down next to him. His eyes were closed. She felt for a pulse. It was there, but just a trickle.

“Evan, can you hear me?”

He opened his eyes, managed a smile. “Boy, this sucks, right?”

He laughed feebly.

All Amy could do was let the tears slide down her face. She took off her sweater, balled it up, and placed it over his wound. “You’re going to be fine, Evan. I swear.”

“Amy, look out!” screamed Dan.

Amy ducked and the sword missed her by an inch. The Vesper holding it reared back to try again. But he had picked the wrong time to try to kill her. Amy lashed out with a tremendous kick and the man toppled to the floor. As she turned back to Evan, she heard a little gasp.

She looked down at him. His eyes were open. But they were no longer seeing. His arms slid off his chest and lay limp next to him.

Amy took one long, shuddering breath, and then closed Evan’s eyes.

Then she rose, turned, and plunged back into the fight. But there was only one person she wanted to destroy.

Vesper One.

And she would. Or die trying.

Whatever happened, one of them would not see the sun rise ever again.

They beat back the Vespers, forcing them from the room where the Doomsday device was located. Hamilton and Jake had managed to wrench several guns from the Vespers. They each had one and had given one to Amy and the last weapon to Reagan. They had carried the bodies of Natalie and Evan to a far corner and found blankets to cover them. Amy and Sinead were cleaning and bandaging Fiske Cahill’s injured shoulder. Fortunately, the bullet had gone clean through. But he was in a lot of pain, though he tried not to show it. As they were working on him he kept staring over at the two bodies under the blankets.

“That should be me under there,” he told Amy and Sinead. “Not Evan and Natalie. I’m old. They had their whole lives ahead of them.”

Amy said nothing. She just kept winding gauze around Fiske’s shoulder and arm.

Sinead said, “Before this is over, we might all be dead.”

“Cheery thought,” said Dan as he joined them.

They had posted sentries at all entry points to the room. Hamilton, Reagan, and Jake, being the most athletic and having guns, had taken the first watch and intently gazed at all possible attack points.

There were thirteen of them left now, thought Amy.

Maybe an unlucky thirteen.

“You’re good to go,” said Amy as she applied the last bit of adhesive to Fiske’s dressings.

“Thank you, Amy.” He looked over at the bodies. “Alistair, now Natalie and Evan.”

“It would have been ridiculous to think that everyone could survive this,” said Sinead logically, if dispassionately.

Amy wasn’t listening to her. She stared up at the Doomsday device. Ian had already told them about the electrical charge, so they knew not to touch it. She wondered what was going on outside this mountain. Had catastrophe already struck?

What would happen if it were fully initiated?

She turned to Sinead, Dan, and Atticus, who had come to sit next to them.

“Talk to me about subduction zones. I’ve read about them, but I need to know more.”

“What do you want to know?” asked Atticus.

“If I have it right, we’re sitting on a big one.”

Sinead said, “Yes, as I explained on the train before. It stretches a long way both east and west.”

“So if the device taps into it, the destruction would follow that exact route, both ways?” asked Amy.

Atticus looked unsure. So did Sinead.

Dan said, “I guess I see what you’re getting at. Vesper One brought the hostages here. He’s here. If he starts this sucker up, then both the hostages and he would be the first to die.”

“That’s what had Isabel confused, too,” added Atticus. “I guess she thought Vesper One was far too vain to take his own life.”

“Reversing the polarity of the magnetic poles,” said Amy. “Results?”

Fiske rubbed his injured shoulder and sat back against the rock wall. “So, that’s what we’re talking about here? Reversing magnetic polarity?”

“Well, it’s about subduction zones, too,” amended Amy.

“All right. I can give you a little insight into both, actually.”

“You can?” said Amy.

“I’ve traveled all over the world, particularly in my youth. Spent some time at a research facility in Amsterdam that specialized in collecting data on the Earth’s magnetic poles. When I was in Japan I learned about subduction zones from a scientist there studying tsunamis.”

“Cool,” said Dan. “We know if you reverse the poles it’s catastrophic.”

Fiske looked at him curiously. “Actually, the magnetic poles of the Earth have reversed many times over the eons.”

“What?” exclaimed Dan and Atticus together.

“Oh, yes. The last time was nearly eight hundred thousand years ago, so I don’t exactly recall the details. Even I’m no t that old. And on a daily basis, the magnetic poles can wander up to fifty miles.”

Amy looked confused. “But how is that possible? Our research showed it could be catastrophic, cause all sorts of natural disasters.”

Fiske explained, “The Earth’s magnetic field protects us from cosmic radiation. The field itself is produced by interaction of the Earth’s solid inner iron core with its outer liquid one. When the poles reverse, the field never actually dips to zero. But even if it did, we would be protected by the sun’s magnetic field, which, by the way, reverses polarity  
every nine to twelve years.”

Dan said, “So am I getting this right? Reversing the polarity of the Earth is not a big deal? Because apparently old Archimedes thought it was and he was, like, freaking brilliant.”

Fiske rubbed his shoulder and grimaced. “I didn’t say that, Danny boy. Ordinarily, reversing the polarity takes place over thousands of years. People and other living things have time to adapt, and so does the Earth and its axial rotational spectrum.”

Amy nodded in understanding. “But if it happened really quickly? Not over several thousand years, but maybe in a matter of minutes? I think that’s what Archimedes was afraid of.”

“A trial run for the Vespers,” said Dan bitterly.

Fiske nodded slowly. “Given that, all bets are off. Now, when you couple accelerated reverse polarity with proximity to a major subduction zone, it’s like a match and a river of fuel. The accelerated reverse polarity is the match and the subduction zone, is the river of fuel. The catastrophic results would stretch far and wide. Natural disaster piled on natural disaster. Not pretty.”

They all looked up at the Doomsday device.

“And that may be the key to it all,” said Amy.

Ian came over and pointed to the empty niche in the center of the device.

“So long as we keep the last component out of there, we can stop it. That’s the place for the gear to be inserted. I’m sure of it.”

“I think you’re right, Ian,” said Amy.

“But how long can we do that?” said Dan. “And we can’t destroy the thing. We can’t even touch it without being electrocuted.”

Fiske nodded. “And at some point Vesper One will regroup his people and attack. And if we can’t beat them off, he’ll be able to execute his plan.”

They all sat there looking glum.

Dan said, “So we just sit here waiting for them to come? That seems stupid.”

Amy looked up at the Doomsday device. For her it represented the culmination, perversely, of their traveling the globe involuntarily to do Vesper One’s bidding. She looked over at Dan, who was staring up at the monstrosity, too. He glanced at her.

“We made this possible,” he said starkly.

“What choice did we have?” she asked.

“We sacrificed the world for a few friends and family,” said Dan, just as starkly.

“We didn’t know that at the time,” she pointed out in a sharp tone.

“We could have guessed. Vesper One was not exactly doing all this for the good of mankind. We had to know that it would turn out bad.”

Amy looked over at the bodies of Natalie and Evan. Dan followed her gaze.

They exchanged a silent look.

“Maybe you’re right,” said Amy. “And maybe I screwed up big-time. Some leader I turned out to be.”

“It’s not over yet, Amy,” said Fiske, studying her quietly. “And let’s look at the positives.”

“Like what?” she asked grimly.

“Well, let’s see. You figured out what the plan was. You got in this place. You helped rescue us. We are now in a position to stop Vesper One.”

“And Natalie and Evan are dead. So is Alistair.”

“And we could all die, too,” said Fiske. “But you have put us in a position where we have a chance. A shot to make this right. To make sure that Alistair and Evan and Natalie didn’t die in vain.”

Amy thought about this for a few moments and finally nodded. “You’re right, Fiske. You’re a good uncle.”

“I wouldn’t go that far. But I have my moments.”

“So, what do we do?” asked Dan in exasperation. “To stop them?”

Amy gazed up at the device. A sudden shift in the poles, as Fiske had pointed out, would be catastrophic. But how did they stop it from happening? At that instant something occurred to her.

She looked at Fiske and Dan, who were nearby. “I don’t think Vesper One is the suicidal type.”

“What do you mean?” asked Fiske.

“He wants to rule the world, not leave it. And Sinead showed me the subduction zones on the computer while we were on the train. She said they worked like underground rivers, or maybe oceans. They create a tsunami, building pressure, which then races off to do damage at some other place. The zone under us runs both east and west, but I don’t think they’re connected. So if the device creates a tsunami effect here . . . ?”

Dan said, “Then it’ll build, but do no damage, at its origins.”

Fiske added, “But it’ll build over time, and when it hits its target —”

Amy finished for him, “It’ll be obliterated.”

“Wow, that’s a relief,” said Dan sarcastically. “So at least we won’t die in a tsunami. We’ll just be murdered by the Vespers.”

Amy ignored him and looked over in a corner, where there were some wooden crates piled high. She opened a few. Inside were just some copper wires and other odds and ends that Vesper One must have used to construct the device. She closed the last crate.

“There must be a series of electromagnets built in there,” she said, pointing at the device. “Powerful ones.”

“I would imagine there are,” agreed Fiske.

Amy continued, “But there are different ways to create electric and magnetic fields. A changing electrical field creates a magnetic field and vice versa. That’s what makes generators and motors possible. A weakening electrical signal creates a stronger magnetic field, and then the reverse is also true.”

“So exactly how does that help us?” asked Dan in exasperation. “I feel like I’m in a physics class. And I’m not even in high school.”

“Magnetic fields created by electrical currents cease to be when the electrical current stops,” replied Amy.

“That’s right,” said Fiske. “No power, no electromagnetic field.”

“Hello?” said Dan. “That sucker has plenty of power. It’s electrified.”

“But I wonder what its source is,” mulled Amy, looking around the base.

“There has to be a source of electrical power. If we can somehow find it and turn it off . . . ?”

“Then the device will be rendered inoperable,” said Fiske.

Atticus said, “But how do we turn it off?”

Amy, Dan, and Fiske stared helplessly at one another.

“Maybe if we had some water we could create a short circuit,” said Fiske.

“We had a lot of water in another room,” replied Dan. “But I don’t see a faucet in here.” 

Amy said, “We could try throwing things at it.”

She picked up the metal bar that Natalie had used. “Stand back,” she said.

She threw the bar at the device. It struck against it, held there for a moment, and then fell away.

“Well, that didn’t work,” pointed out Dan unnecessarily.

Fiske said quietly, “I think, Amy, that the only option we have is to keep the Vespers from reaching the device.”

“Meaning this is our Waterloo,” said Dan. “Our Custer’s Last Stand,” he added grimly.

Fiske nodded. “I think it might be, because I don’t see any other way out.”

“Well, if that’s the way it’s going to be, so be it,” said Amy resignedly. She watched as Sinead joined her brother, who was sitting with his back to a wall. As Amy continued to look on, Sinead put her arms around Ted and quietly spoke to him. Amy looked over at Dan and saw him watching the Starlings as well.

Dan and Amy exchanged an understanding glance.

Dan moved next to Amy and said, “I guess, being triplets, the Starlings have a really close bond.”

“I don’t think that’s limited to triplets, Dan. I think it goes for all brothers and sisters. Or it should, anyway.”

“Do you think the serum might actually help Ted and Ned?” Dan asked.

“It’s not worth it, Dan. It never was. The effects are so unknown, it could easily end up doing far more harm than good. I think Sinead realized that, too. She knows that Vesper One only used her because he knew she wanted to help her brothers so badly.” She broke off and looked at Sinead again. “And maybe there’s something a lot stronger and purer anyway that will help them get better.”

“What’s that?” asked Dan.

“Love. The most powerful thing in the universe.”

As she said it Amy glanced once more over at Evan’s body. Her eyes began to tear up.

Dan noticed this and put an arm around her, leading her off to the side and helping her to sit down as her body shook.

The shaking gave way to shudders and sobbing and then gasping. And then Amy Cahill dried her eyes and sat up straight.

“Fiske was right.”

“About what?”

“If we don’t finish this, if we don’t beat the Vespers, everyone will have died in vain.”

“Well, we are going to beat them,” said Dan. “Guaranteed. Done deal!”

Amy gazed proudly at him. “I can always count on you to lift my spirits.”

“When I’m not bugging the crap out of you.”

“And don’t I know it.”

Dan looked over at Natalie’s body.

Ian sat next to it, his head on his drawn-up knees, his eyes closed, the tears sliding down his cheeks.

Dan asked, “Do you think Isabel will even care . . . about Natalie?”

Amy wiped her eyes one last time. “I would like to think that every mother would care about losing her child. That no matter how evil and ruthless you are, you would care about your own flesh and blood.” She paused. “But with Isabel I’m not sure. She’s not like other mothers. She’s not like other human beings, for that matter.”

“That’s okay. We’ll care.”

She tousled his hair. “Yes, we will.”

“They’re probably watching us,” Dan whispered to his sister.

“I know. I’m sure this whole complex is wired for surveillance.”

“Do you think they’ll be coming soon?”

“Soon enough,” said Amy.

“We’ve got four guns and thirteen people. They’ll have a lot more than that.”

“That’s okay. We’re always the underdogs. Makes us work harder.”

“You’re just trying to make me feel better.”

“Pretty much, yes.”

“Think we can get out of this one, Amy?”

“I think we have as good a shot as anyone. Under the circumstances,” she added.

“Quite diplomatic of you,” said Fiske, who had been listening.

Amy wasn’t really listening to Fiske. She was once more staring up at the Doomsday device. She drew closer.

“Amy, don’t get that close,” warned Dan. “It might suck you in or something.”

Amy was staring at the empty niche where the gear would have to be inserted for the device to fully work. Dan drew next to her and looked at where she was staring.

“What are you thinking?” he asked.

“I’m thinking that in order for Vesper One to start up this sucker, he’s going to have to turn off the ‘force field’ to insert the gear.” 

Dan’s eyes widened. “You’re right. But how does that help us?”

“We’ll see,” his sister said vaguely. “But with the power off, we might have our chance. Remember we were trying to think of a way to short-circuit it? That way we won’t have to. He’ll do it for us.”

“I hope you’re right,” said Dan uneasily. 

Hamilton called out, “I hear something.”

They all froze and listened intently.

Jake said, “They’re coming.

Everyone get ready.” He stepped back from the door, took cover behind some large boxes, and slipped out his gun, aiming it at the doorway.

Hamilton did likewise at the portal he was guarding.

All the others took up various positions of hiding around the room, but in places where they could attack in an instant.

Sinead ran over to Reagan. “Let me have your gun.”

“What?”

“Your gun, let me have it.”

“Why?”

“I’m a better shot. And you’re better fighting with your feet and hands. We all have to play to our strengths.”

“The only problem is, I don’t trust you,” Reagan shot back.

“But I do.”

They both turned to see Amy there.

She held her gun out to Sinead.

“I trust you, Sinead.”

“Are you sure?” asked Sinead, looking surprised. She didn’t move to take the weapon.

“I don’t have any choice.”

Sinead slowly reached out and took the gun.

Reagan gave her gun to Amy.

“Sinead is right. Play to our strengths.” She raced over to guard another doorway.

Sinead looked at Amy. “I won’t disappoint you. I’ll fight to the death.”

“I know. We all will. We have no choice, really.”

The two young women shared a hug and then headed off to different parts of the room.

Amy ran over to where Dan was kneeling behind some boxes. He was smacking his fists together, his eyes rotating among the doors in and out of the room. Amy knelt next to him, her gaze darting around the room as well.

“This is it,” she said.

“Yep,” said Dan.

“Wish you had the serum?”

He turned to her, clearly surprised by the question. “No, I’m glad I don’t.”

“Want to win fair and square?”

“Something like that, yeah.”

“What separates us from the Vespers of the world.”

“I guess it does.”

“Whatever happens, I love you, Dan.”

Her eyes grew misty and Dan’s did, too.

Brother and sister shared a quick hug.

“I’ll see you when it’s over,” said Dan.

“Yes, you will,” replied his sister.

Amy hurried off. She stopped near the device and eyed the empty niche and then her pistol. She listened to the hum of the electricity coming from the device. Then, as she drew closer, she felt something tug hard on her pistol.

Surprised, she looked up at the Doomsday device, the idea coming to her in a flash.

If only it could work, she thought.

She ran to the others. “Put the guns down,” she said. “And take off any metal you have now.” They all looked at her like she was crazy. “Just do it now. Please. It’s the only chance we have.”

The pistols were placed on the floor and everyone took off any metal they had on.

Amy put the pistol down, ran to one of the crates, threw it open, and pulled out the copper wiring. Carrying it wrapped around her shoulder, she raced back to the device and began to walk around it, unspooling the wire as she did so. She jumped back as the wire flew from her hands and wrapped itself around the device like a mummy’s bandages. Praying that it would work, she ran over to the others, who were staring at her, bewildered, until their pistols and other metal objects started flying off and sticking to the device.

“What have you done, Amy?” screamed Reagan.

“Given us a real chance, I hope.” And then she had no more time to think at all. The distant sounds now became far clearer. And nearer. The battle was about to begin.

The last battle, thought Amy. There was no escape possible this time. It was kill or be killed. She drew a quick breath and waited.

It wouldn’t be long now.

The Vespers were coming.

Not one of the three doors was thrown open.

It, of course, could not be that easy.

The walls opened instead, hissing along on motorized tracks.

This caught the Cahills momentarily off guard as hordes of screaming Vespers poured through these openings, carrying guns and metal bats.

Then it was the Vespers who were caught off guard.

A dozen of them holding guns were ripped off their feet and flew through the air, landing against the device, sticking to it, and being instantly electrocuted.

“Now!” screamed Amy. “Attack!”

“Charge!” bellowed Fiske as he ran forward.

They clashed in the middle of the room. Many of the Vespers had realized that the device had been turned into a giant electromagnet and had hastily dropped their weapons before they zoomed off to attach to the machine. But there weren’t as many Vespers as before. And they couldn’t use guns.

Or knives, as one found out when he pulled a long blade and tried to slash Sinead with it. He was catapulted over her and landed upside down against the device.

All thirteen of the Cahills fought like demons. Despite his injuries, Fiske kicked and punched like an enraged beast.

Hamilton, Jake, and Reagan mowed down Vesper after Vesper, using all of their strength and fighting skill.

Amy and Dan once more stood back-to-back, punching and kicking all Vespers who came near them. Even Atticus and Ted were swinging and kicking, although they often didn’t hit anything other than themselves.

Amy watched with pride as Sinead slammed into two Vespers who were on the verge of strangling Nellie, knocking both of them unconscious.

Jonah was racing around, kicking and singing a cappella, timing his kicks with pitch-perfect crescendos.

Phoenix was the first to go down under the sheer weight of the Vespers, who kept crowding into the room.

Little by little the Cahills were pushed back. They finally formed a circle in the middle of the room, and stood fighting side by side. Jake and Amy found themselves shoulder to shoulder. They glanced at each other during a brief break in the battle.

“How you holding up, Ames?” he asked.

“Been better. You?”

“Could use some downtime.”

“Maybe we can go somewhere warm after this is over.”

“Yeah, maybe we can.”

“We’re going to die, aren’t we?” asked Amy.

“Probably, but we’re going to take as many of them with us as possible,” answered Jake.

“I like your style.”

“Back at you.”

“ENOUGH!”

The voice boomed throughout the room and everyone suddenly froze in midpunch and kick.

Vesper One and Sandy entered the room. Sandy was pulling along a wooden cart on which rested a large wooden case.

The Vespers parted, allowing Vesper One to come forward, where he stood a few feet from his circle of opponents. He looked at Amy. “It’s over,” he said calmly. “And you’ve lost.”

“Who says?” asked Amy.

“He said,” snapped Sandy. “And he’s Vesper One. And I’m Vesper Two. And if you don’t mind, we’re on a tight schedule. We’re planning to destroy Chicago and we have to get a move on.”

Vesper One said, “So it’s time for the Cahills to admit defeat. Give up now and you will be spared. Resist further and every one of you will die a horrible death. You have ten seconds to decide.”

Amy and the others looked around at one another. Actually, they were all looking at her. She stood tall, put up her fists, and said, “I’ll take the horrible death, you freak.”

All the others put their fists up, too, and prepared to fight on.

“Have it your way,” said Vesper One. “Mercy isn’t really my thing, anyway.” He turned to Sandy. “Hand out the stone clubs.”

Sandy opened the crate he had rolled in and began to hand out long clubs that

had wooden handles and heavy stone ends.

When each of his men had a weapon, Vesper One looked at Amy and said, “I’m thrilled to be able to fulfill your last wish of dying a horrible death.” He turned to his followers. “Kill them. Now!”

Before a single Vesper could move, one of the doors to the chamber was blasted open by the force of six other Vespers being thrown through it.

What came through the door after them made everyone in the room, even Vesper One, take a long step back.

Isabel stood before them. She looked the same and yet she looked different.

There was something ethereal about her movements. She seemed to be floating a few inches above the floor. It was as though she were no longer confined by the physical properties of the Earth. And if one looked closely she seemed fairly red in the face, almost like she had a bad sunburn.

Dan looked at Amy. “Wow. It really did work.”

She hissed, “She’s red! What did you put in the serum?”

“Exactly what I was supposed to. Well, and some red M&M’s for taste. You think that’s where the red color came from?”

A bloodcurdling scream escaping Isabel’s lips, she raced toward the outer circle of Vespers with such speed that it caught all of them unprepared. She smashed into the front row of Vespers with such force that it knocked ten of them head over heels across the room. Others threw their clubs at her, but she effortlessly dodged most of them, her body spinning and contorting in the most amazing ways and utilizing jaw-dropping angles and gymnastic ability. The ones she didn’t dodge she caught and sent flying back at their original owners with the velocity of a bullet and dead-on aim, dropping them all. She next lifted up three Vespers, their feet dangling ten feet above the floor, and threw them across the room, where they hit the far wall and fell to the floor, dead.

Sandy had already made a run for the door, his face pale, his expression panicked.

He ran right into a still-soaked Cheyenne and Casper, who were coming through the doorway. They snagged the intrepid, if diabolical, weatherman and carried him off kicking and screaming.

Casper said nastily, “Just the scumball we wanted to run into.”

Meanwhile, like a flesh-and-bone meat cleaver, Isabel raced through the ranks of the Vespers, kicking, punching, and catapulting through the air. With each blow a Vesper fell, while any attempts to land a solid strike against her failed. She was too fast, too nimble, and too quick-thinking. She seemed to know what the Vespers were going to do before they even did it. She was like a dozen perfect fighting machines rolled into one.

Vesper One turned and ran toward the Doomsday device.

Amy saw this and raced after him, Dan on her heels.

Jake, Sinead, and all the others ran away from Isabel’s approach and hid behind some crates. From there they watched as Vespers flew around the room, crashing and dying as Isabel tore through them.

When all the Vespers were vanquished, Isabel stopped and turned to the body of her daughter. She sailed over to her, lifted off the blanket, and stared down at Natalie. And for one instant Isabel looked closer to a human being than she ever had. Then she put the Isabel looked closer to a human being than she ever had. Then she put the blanket back and turned to stare at Vesper One, the degree of hatred in her eyes awful to behold.

Amy and Dan were within feet of him, blocking his escape.

Vesper One was not looking at them, or Isabel. His attention was on the Doomsday device. In his hand was the gear. In his other hand was a remotecontrol device.

With a flick, he turned off the electrical power. The machine powered down and all the Vespers and metal stuck to it immediately fell to the floor.

He rushed forward, the gear poised in his hand.

“Oh, no you don’t!” screamed Amy.

She and Dan flew forward to stop him from inserting the last gear.

But an instant later they were hurled to the side as Isabel pushed past them with astonishing speed.

She collided with Vesper One right as he reached the device. He stretched out and placed the gear in the niche. The device started to glow with power, even as Isabel and Vesper One fought each other.

In another instant they were both sucked toward the device as it came on full power.

“LOOK OUT!” screamed Sinead.

The walls and ceiling of the room began to shake. Bits of rock tumbled down and hit the floor, creating small craters.

The power surge in the device became stronger.

As Amy and Dan watched from a distance, Vesper One was caught between Isabel and the device. He was slowly and inexorably being crushed between the unstoppable force and the immovable object. When he realized this seconds later, he panicked. But by then it was too late. The walls and ceiling began to shake more and more, as if an earthquake was happening. Huge chunks of rock were now falling from the walls and ceiling.

Jake grabbed Amy and Dan. “We’ve got to get out of here. The whole mountain is coming down,” he screamed.

Amy, Dan, and the others dodged tumbling rocks as they raced to the doorway.

Amy yelled, “But what about the Doomsday device? We have to stop it.”

Fiske’s calming voice reached her. “I think we just did. Look!”

Amy shot a glance at the device.

Vesper One appeared to have melted right into the thing. It seemed that his face was now part of the machine.

Meanwhile, Isabel was ripping at the device, tearing off huge chunks of it with her superpowered hands. The machine started to misfire, sending out massive surges of electrical energy. And then it started to shake uncontrollably as Isabel continued to rip it apart. As he ran, Fiske looked back and yelled, “She’s destroying it. But I think it’s going to blow any second.”

A few seconds later, an enormous explosion occurred, lifting Amy off her feet.

An instant before that happened, all Amy could remember seeing was the device, Vesper One, and Isabel Kabra disintegrate into dust. The entire room shook once more, and then everything went black.


End file.
